Improving insulation to suit an Air Source Heat Pump - what are you doing?

Adding soffit vents is simple and cheap. These cost 35p each from Toolstation

Vent tiles within the roof are no good unless they penetrate the felt layer. How are you going to do that without risk of rain entering should a tile break in future?

And here’s a pack of 50 inter-rafter ventilation trays from the Roofing Superstore at just under £70

These trays enable you to implement the diagram I posted earlier.

Thanks ! that’s very helpful.

Whilst I’m busy name-dropping, there’s a massive national wholesaler called Sheffield Insulation Group (SIG) with a wide range of products.

What few people realise is that they sell smaller quantities to end-customers under the trading name Insulation Express.

So @juliamc will probably want to start reading the guides and product ranges in the section about Floor Insulation.

Be aware that SIG often make deliveries using their own fleet of enormous lorries that have a fork-lift truck hanging off the back. So be prepared to simply have a pallet dropped off for you to unpack!

As @juliamc (and probably other Trialists) has an Energy Report suggesting that the main losses are through the floor, then there are number of retrofit solutions which can increase heat retention for minimum rise in floor levels.

Some even have underfloor heating pipe tracks routed into the insulation boards. Here’s one from Uponor, called Siccus, available in 15mm and 30mm varients:

If you’re going to add insulation beneath a new floor surface, then it makes sense to install a mechanism which also allows future upgrades to UFH. This uses water at lower temperature than radiators, and hence the Heat pump operates more efficiently.

I must however point out that running an UFH system like this during the Trial would interfere with the calculations they require for their report to BEIS.

The part of the original report which I found hard to comprehend was to increase the insulation, consider triple glazed windows - and then to increase the ventilation. Seems a daft amount of expense to me and I won't be changing my windows. 

@Gingernut49 what else was suggested on your report ?

I can't remember now. I'm just going out but I'll have a look later. It's on my emails. I'm not doing anything more except having to have a cupboard built around the installation as it didn't all fit in the boiler cupboard I had before. That's costing me about £700 as I have to get someone to do it. I'm only on a state pension. 

I think those costs need adding into the report which will eventually end up with BEIS. There’s no point in the Government being led into believing that this strategy is viable if you ignore all the accessories (including redecoration in some instances).

Just back in. I've had an email from research@emailicf.com asking me to fill in a survey about my installation and I'm not sure I can until Ovo sort out my billing. 

I'm delighted with my warm home but so far not the energy usage.

The fact that the bills are a shambles is a valid bit of feedback, @Gingernut49 !

It’s possible that the survey doesn’t allow for this sort of feedback however. ICF are just a 3rd-party survey company, not directly involved with the Trial operation.

Even if your bills were sorted out, the Trial itself doesn’t appear to be financially viable. Taking into account additional insulation, you still need to be getting electricity for about 7p per kWh during the early evening peak. That’s just not going to happen, whichever Energy Supplier you were with.

Frankly, we could pretty well write the conclusion to the Final Report at this stage, couldn’t we?

The only reason for waiting a year is to have some real usage/cost figures to back up that conclusion.