Eco Home Heating

With conventional boilers, 1kW of input energy provides less than 1kW of output energy or heat. With Ecodan, every 1kW of input energy is converted into an average of 3.6kW of output energy or heat, making it more than three times as efficient as conventional boilers and a natural choice for low cost heating and hot water. Click the chart below to enlarge CO2 emissions for various heating systems.

The Co-efficient of Performance (COP) of a heat pump is the ratio of the heat delivered, divided by the power consumed. The modern heat pump technology used in Ecodan and given in this example has the seasonal COP rating of 3.6. By 2016, over 720,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions per annum could be saved if all the 200,000 residential properties built each year installed heat pumps. If a heat pump also replaced 10% of the gas boilers sold each year in existing properties, the potential annual saving would increase to over 2 million tonnes of CO2 by 2016. By transforming the energy found naturally in outdoor air and using that to help provide cost effective heating, we’ve already established the efficiency of Ecodan and the fact that it ‘upgrades’ energy. Take that one step further and consider using Ecodan powered by electricity from a renewable energy source such as wind, biomass, solar or tidal and you could have a heating system that is zero carbon rated. Another advantage with Ecodan is it’s ease of installation and design flexibility. A perfect answer to those wide areas of the UK that are not perhaps on, or likely to be on the National Gas Grid. This negates the need to consider the more costly options of electricity or oil and removes the need to negotiate the enormous expense and disruption of extending the National Gas Grid.

Inverter-driven technology

At the heart of Ecodan is a modern, inverter-driven heat pump compressor which converts free energy from the air and upgrades it to higher temperatures suitable for heating. The inverter control regulates the system so that heat output modulates to match the exact capacity required, meaning the boiler will only consume the exact energy needed at any given time and thus increase efficiency further. The advanced heating technology used in heat pumps make them ideal for use in the UK’s ambient temperatures and hence perfect for the domestic market.

The technology inside the heat pump is similar to any domestic refrigerator, which uses a vapour compression cycle. The main components in the heat pump are the compressor, the expansion valve and two heat exchangers (an evaporator and a condenser).

How it works

• Refrigerant in the evaporator is colder than the heat source. This causes the heat to move from the heat source (in this case the outside air) to the refrigerant, which then evaporates.
• This vapour moves to the compressor and reaches a higher temperature and pressure.
• The hot vapour now enters the condenser and gives off heat as it condenses.
• The refrigerant then moves to the expansion valve; drops in temperature and pressure; and then returns to the evaporator.