Will Falconer Architect

Over the past few years there’s been a lot of discussion in the UK about the changeover to heat pumps.

Unfortunately, for the most part we are simply having the wrong discussion.

This conversation we should be having is how to vastly increase the insulation is the UK’s abysmally poor housing stock to reduce the heating requirement.

Heat pumps simply won’t work in most current UK houses because the heat losses are so great. Any heat pump installation must go hand in hand with insulation to make the heating requirement as low as possible. To give credit where it is due, the Green Party have been saying this for some time.

Improving the insulation should be matched by improving the ventilation so that the building can breathe.

So where do we start?

Various authorities cite these percentage figures for heat loss which must be read with some scepticism:

Roof (uninsulated) 25%

Walls 35%

Windows 10-15%

Doors 5%

Floor 10-15%

My own view is that the figures for roof and walls should probably be reversed even if the roof is insulated.

Most houses rely on fibreglass quilt which is fairly useless as an insulant.

But also these figures depend on the proportion of wall to roof, how big the windows are etc.

I’ll be writing more on this but if you would like some advice on a specific building please get in touch