Before I start, I hope nobody takes from this that we shouldn’t do domestic hot water (DHW) with HPs. And as things evolve, I’m sure that we will do more of it, and do it better. However, I was pondering the issue of mass adoption of HPs for smaller houses and how we tackle DHW in the immediate future.
Many years ago, when heat pump components were less developed, providing energy-efficient hot tap water (DHW) with a heat pump (HP) was a struggle. However, it’s not difficult to add the feature since in its simplest form all you need is a diverter valve and a cylinder with large-area heat exchanger coil in it. Even if the DHW might have had a COP as low as 2 (at that time), it seemed worth it.
It took me quite a few years to acknowledge that the losses associated with cylinders and distribution can be considerable. We often hear claims that boilers are 90% efficient, or heat pumps (at 60°C) have a COP say 2.5, but if we look at the actual heat delivered to your bath or basin, then both of these figures could in practice be halved in a few cases, or possibly considerably worse. Ironically, frugal users have the lowest COP because the losses are a greater proportion of the total. (this doesn’t of course mean you save energy by using more water!!)
When I get the opportunity, I often run a hot tap in a house and see how long it takes for it to run-hot. Sometimes a whole basin is filled with cold water before the hot emerges. We could in this scenario, get one basin of useful hot water for two basins draw-off from the cylinder. This experiment demonstrates 50% efficiency, and effectively halves the boiler or HP efficiency. The more that is used (in succession), the smaller the proportion of loss.
It’s not only the old houses with a 22mm main artery hot water draw off where the problem lies. I am amazed how bad some new build is. Surely pipes should take the most direct and shortest route…. Seemingly not. Surely we would go for the smallest bore pipe that still gives adequate flow. If we did, there would be a better range of pipe diameters on sale. Excessively large bore pipes are a waste of water and heat, but arguably the heat is contained within the house, and is at least useful in cold weather.
For those of you thinking of lagging hot pipe runs… think it through. Sometimes the benefit of this is minimal. e.g. after 30 mins most heat is lost regardless of insulation thickness. Pipes around cylinders are however always hot, and these definitely need insulating well.
Pumped circulation loops are another thing. This is a necessary evil for large places like hotels, and at least provide hot water immediately a tap is turned on. I have limited experience of these… only bad ones. I’m told this can be done well, nonetheless it’s potentially a big waste of energy so they need careful design and very good pipe insulation.
Loss due to pipe runs is one thing, but another is of course the heat loss from the cylinder, this heat is again arguably beneficial for much of the year. Even with no draw-off, a heat pump can spend a surprising amount of time simply topping up the cylinder.
Out there in the real world, I don’t actually know how bad these losses are, but feel they could be surprisingly bad in many cases, but hopefully many are acceptably good. It is sort of bizarre that manufacturers optimise heat pumps to get the best COP, but on site, but some aspects need for energy-efficiency often seem overlooked.
Anyhow, with the thought in the back of my mind that DHW from a HP might be not as good as we often assume, I was pondering the issue of mass adoption of heat pumps. One issue for smaller houses is the lack of cupboard space for a DHW cylinder. They have not had one with the combi boiler, so why would they accept one with a heat pump?!
If cylinders are unacceptable, would it be a backward step to install a space-heating-only HP system and electric point-of-use DHW? (non-storage type that is). I don’t know, but there are some Advantages
- No space lost due to a cylinder
- Heat pump system extremely simple
- considerably cheaper to install
Disadvantages
- you still need to install several instant point-of-use water heaters… more total electric supply required from distribution board and more cable runs.
- Higher peak load on mains supply, but this would be spread by diversity
Ironically, those small houses that really won’t welcome a cylinder, could also have short pipe runs, so my argument about long pipe losses doesn’t hold here. It’s actually larger houses where the long pipe runs can be very lossy. Hopefully the installer thinks it through, and doesn’t (for example) run a hot pipe to a distant hand basin.
Some cylinder-related details to sort out
Another possible headache relating to heat pump DHW cylinders is the need for safety blending valves. And this is sometimes needed because of the required periodic legionella pasteurisation. These mixing valves usually allow some cold water to pass. This means the cylinder needs to be stored at a higher temperature to combat this cold ‘seepage’. Higher temperature means lower COP. We need safety mixing valves that can shut off the cold completely.
The ‘thermal store’ type arrangement, where water heats instantly as it passes a store, can mitigate many of these problems, but it can have its own inherent losses. This type of storage arrangement could be the way things develop. Who knows!
Phase-change storage could be a solution to the lack of space issue, but I feel there are a few challenges here. Namely that the phase-change often happens at a high heat-pump-unfriendly temperature, and conducting heat in and out can be an added problem. Early days I feel.
Another element to this discussion is the quantity of water needed. If a house uses a lot of hot water, then the losses due to cylinders and pipes may be a relatively small proportion of the total, so HP-heated DHW would be advantageous. It is ironic that frugal users score badly for overall efficiency. If water use is low. Point-of-use (COP=1) might be the best option.
Whilst large houses surely use enough water to warrant heat pump heating, it is these that where the biggest challenges arise from large distances distributing water. I feel that this is where research is needed.
I’m not really sure how I actually sit on this whole topic, but we seem to still be in the ‘finding out’ stage with heat pumps… finding out what is most viable and most practical, so we need to try things out on all fronts. I can think of two small houses right now that could benefit from ASHPs feeding the existing radiators (with some size tweaking), and it would seem disproportionally expensive and complicated to add DHW to the install. One has an electric shower only.. no bath. I can also think of older houses that really need the whole hot water distribution pipework renewing to save energy. This could be very disruptive and expensive.
On the other hand, I can think of more situations where a hot water cylinder is surely a worthwhile thing. If nothing else, houses with any form of Solar heating… this needs storing somewhere!
Improvements
Back to the actual heat pump, there is a thing called a de-superheater. The concept has been around since heat pump started. In essence it’s a heat-exchanger fitted to the compressor hot outlet pipe. In simple terms, you can get say 10-15% of the heat at a higher temperature whilst also space heating or cooling. Ecoforest offer this feature in their HTR version of GSHP. I hope other manufacturers have this offering too. In the past, I have felt it a case that manufacturers are driven by costs, and added manufacture cost are not welcome, but as a customer, this would be a feature I would like. Systems with integral cylinders should be benefiting from relatively minor changes. I’m not aware of it, but maybe they are starting to do it already. I am hoping that we see more developments like this.
For now though, I think more focus is needed on pipe distribution. This should be basic good housekeeping.
There is a bit more about the basics of DHW here https://heatpumps.co.uk/types-of-heat-pump/domestic-hot-water-dhw/
Hi John,
Excellent blog!
You say: ‘Phase-change storage could be a solution to the lack of space issue, but I feel there are a few challenges here. Namely that the phase-change often happens at a high heat-pump-unfriendly temperature, and conducting heat in and out can be an added problem. Early days I feel.’
It’s certainly early days and there is only really one phase-change heat storage system on the market: Sunamp. The current Sunamp takes its heating input via hot water (at about 55 degrees, I think) and that is at the top end of flow temperatures for air source heat pumps.
But isn’t there a much better solution!
Combine a heat pump and a phase-change thermal store in such a way that the heat pump’s hot gas circuit heats the phase-change material directly. By running the hot gas through the phase-change material you achieve much higher temperatures to melt the phase-change material; and by removing the need to transfer heat from the hot gas to water first (before you transfer that heat to the phase change material) you probably eliminate some losses… and you certainly eliminate a physical piece of engineering, that is, the heat exchanger.
Any idea whether someone is tinkering with something like that? It’ll be a ‘air to phase change material heat pump’.
Yes, I agree completely. Its early days, and as you say, most phase-change work at high (lower COP) temperatures. Using the ‘hot gas’ of the compressor discharge pipe is a great idea (A de-superheater). The only de-superheaters that I know are on GSHPs since its needs 4 hot pipes. Not easy having 4 hot pipes to an ASHP. Could the phase-change material be in the ASHP unit outside? This could have advantages.
A thing to be mindful of here is that whilst most refrigerants actually give similar COPs, the discharge superheat varies. I have not looked into this recently, but it can be gleaned by comparing PH refrigerant charts. I know R290 has low-ish superheat, and R32 may be low-ish too, but it still may be Viable. (now obsolete R22 had very high superheat)
I’m guessing that no manufacturers would be interested sadly. They don’t seem to be interested-enough in energy-efficiency if it involves extra manufacturing cost. That said, Ecoforest to have a desuperheater option… no idea how many installers buy them though.
I’m guessing people are experimenting with phase change, but I dont know who… I would like to know.
I wonder what you think of DHW heat pumps like this one https://www.dimplex.co.uk/product/edel-hot-water-heat-pump
One thing that puzzles me a bit about the design is how the heat transfer happens.
The heat pump sits on top of the water cylinder and I can imagine two different set-ups:
1. compressor in the top unit compresses the gas, thereby heating it > still in the top unit heat is exchanged to a water circuit > water circuit runs down a coil into the ‘bottom’ compartment and the DHW is heated
2. compressor in the top unit compresses the gas, thereby heating it > this gas circuit runs down in a coil into the bottom compartment and the DHW is heated
Do you know which one it is, John? 2 seems simpler and more efficient.
You are right, it would be more energy-efficient, simpler to have the refrigerant Condenser heating the cylinder directly. However, having refrigerant pipes in a cylinder poses problems in manufacture, and also risk of refrigerant in the water. An externally-wrapped coil on the cylinder wall is possible, but some loss of efficiency (due to higher condensing temperature).
They might find it more practical to keep the refrigerant all in one compact unit and pump it to the cylinder. Can you search for a split diagram of inside, or evidence of a water pump on a wiring diagram etc?
I guess you may need to simply trust that a good manufacturer has done the most practical thing in their decision making
Hi John,
I did some searching and found a video showing us inside a DHW heat pump. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaTqss-jMO8 (fast forward to 8 minutes where they open it up).
From what they say in the video, the condenser wraps around the hot water tank.
I love this for its simplicity!
Yes I agree.. very simple and effective. Looks like a nice unit
I have a case in point for DHW distribution. My bungalow is 35m end to end with 4 scattered bathrooms. At the time of me buying and refurbing I did not know a lot about the subject but am now having to re-engineer the whole thing due to serious shortcomings in the “engineer’s” design.
In the unheated loft, he ran a 60m long 35mm copper artery with a 22mm secondary return and teed into the existing 22mm copper drops to baths/showers/basins. Quite apart from costing over a grand just on copper it is hopeless.
The furthest basin takes a staggering 4 minutes to hot. Almost 60l of water sits in the trunk going cold afterwards. That’s 4% efficiency for a single basin or 175p/kwh on oil firing.
Ah but he did install the secondary loop, right? Firstly he forgot the non-return valve on the pump so it draws through both feed and return. And he didn’t insulate the pipes. At all. So the loop loses almost 6kw and runs the 400 litre tank to cold in under 4 hours with no draw off. So the loop is isolated and not used.
Add to that behavourial issues: my teenage daughter pre-heats her shower obviously but over does it by 5-10 minutes or 50l every time. And the wasted water cost. All in all a nightmare.
Plan is:
Rip out the 35mm and replace with 22mm pex loop with 50mm insulation and 15mm secondary return, now 400w loss at 0c ambient. Minimise joints by ‘snaking’ pex loop directly over drops. Follow Armaflex install instructions to the letter.
Pump linked to wireless on-demand buttons.
Drops to basins replaced with 10mm pex for sub 3 second heat up.
Running cost about £200 a year and ticks all the comfort boxes (which is kind of why we have hot water!)
I investigated instantaneous and local electric storage for the basins but I’d need 3x9kw units which, even with diversity, breaks the maximum load and would need expensive prioritising units. Local storage, ie undersinks, lose 1kwh/day each and use even with my 12kw solar would be £200 a year to run and neither solve the shower pre-heat issue.
Running showers on instantaneous would need 3 phase and £££.
On top of all this I use Toshiba VRF commercial air to air for pre-heating on cheap overnight electricity and on sunny shoulder months. I also solar divert but heat all or some of tank with overnight electric per pv generation forecast (solcast). I even have hacked my hot tub and cut the bill on that down to £12 a month!
This year I knocked about 40% off my considerable energy costs even without the DHW changes.
Incidentally, the PV is sized to provide for the swimming pool ASHP. These are interesting units, 18kw air to water with a flow of 35c for £2k or so. COP is around 4 or better with 10c ambient as they use high water flow of 2-5m3/h and a 2c gain. Compare to a retail 15kw air to water at £4-5k.
Wow, what a story! You seem to have it well sorted. Hard to believe anyone could choose such a large pipe size.
What pool ASHP do you have? Some inverter models claim very high COPs. It would be nice to know if they ever achieve this
It’s a Duratec 18kw 2018 model. Non-inverter as you’re not exactly going to overshoot heating a 70m3 pool!
Draws a constant 3kw and puts out 12-18kw depending on air temperature. There are some very fanciful COPs being claimed which my physics professor would find fascinating. Personally anything above 4 I am suspicious of unless T2 is very close to T1. So a pool heater in 25c air heating 30c water has a good chance of hitting 6+.