House of Lords and HoP heat pump

I would think most very large rambling buildings like the Houses of Parliaments, Big museums, palaces etc would be entirely unsuitable for heat pumps. I think as we, as a country, become wholely dependent on elctricity for all our energy needs, buildings like this will start heating the buildings with electric boilers and point-of-us heaters, but with very sophisticated controls that turn on when people walk into rooms, rather like some lights do these days.

I don't disagree M0nica, in fact I wondered why they thought it a good idea in the beginning.

Just testing every avenue I suppose.

A biomass boiler would be a good alternative for large old buildings, they are allegedly environmentally neutral over the long term.

Biomass boilers are large and you need a very large space to store the wood pellets and, for somewhere like the Hof P you would need daily deliveries. You also need to make sure that you wood chips are coming from an approves source. Look at the mess Drax is in over the origin of the wood they burn.

Biomass is for stately homes out in the country where you can generate the wood chips on the estate. For large buildings in urban areas, I can see no alternative to electric heating, but with modern control systems and AI coming into the equation, it should be possible to make these personsensitive, so thatif no one is in the room it isn't heated

You can now get biomass boilers in lots of sizes including for domestic use Monica. People in rural areas are using them already as an alternative to oil fired central heating. I’m sure there is space in the House of Commons for several.

Yes, I know, my neighbour has one, but this discussion is about heating very large rambling buildings like the H of P, and biomass will only be effective (and already is) in rural areas where the surrounding land can provide most of the wood chip needed.

The amount of woodchips needed to service sufficient boilers to cope with big urban buildings like the the HofP would be logistically extremely difficult, and require a large area for storage and numerous deliveries.

When we talk domestic biomass the biomass boilers are considerably bigger than the standard gas or electic boiler, usually requiring a separate room of their own and there needs to be space to store the regular deliveryof sacks of woodchip.

I note that when the people who installed it - and had enough garden and storage to deal with the logistics, moved house, they went to a house with gas central heating, and have not changed it, even though their new house had all the space for a biomass system. I also think the family who bought their house replaced the biomass boiler with a gas boiler. I haven't seen any deliveries of wood chip for several years, whereas once they were a regular sight.

The one I know in a large stately home uses pellets which take up less space than wood chippings Monica. They originally had a coal fired system for central heating, and coal storage, as, I would guess, did Westminster. Anyway, it’s not worth arguing the toss over, unless we know the intimate detail of their heating system.

Out of interest Casdon, can you explain why you seem to be in favour of biomass boilers? The origin of the pellets seems problematic to me.

Biomass boilers are environmentally neutral, and in some circumstances are the best solution Namsnanny, if you have your own wood, or live in a large old house they are more economical than any of the alternatives. I’m not recommending them for general use, they wouldn’t be practical for the average suburban house.

Wood pellet boilers are not allowed in wood framed buildings due to fire risk - many older buildings are wood framed

Margiknot

Wood pellet boilers are not allowed in wood framed buildings due to fire risk - many older buildings are wood framed

True, but there are not millions of timber framed old houses, particularly larger ones, most are stone or brick built in the UK. I doubt if the Houses of Parliament are timber framed, which is what started this diversion?

Margiknot

Wood pellet boilers are not allowed in wood framed buildings due to fire risk - many older buildings are wood framed

Margiknot I am not sure what country you live in, but there is no ban on using wood pellet boilers in timber framed houses in the UK.

The installation of any heating device using hydrocarbon fuel, whether wood chips, wood, gas or oil requires careful planning and adherence to safety regulations.

I live in a 5 bedroom, terraced house. Whatever the environmental case it makes no financial sense at my age to spend large sums on a heat pump installation which I could
never recover the cost of from savings (if any) and I might need my nest egg for a care home later (especially as governments kick the social care can down the road).