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Ground-source heat-pump

(Click to enlarge photo)

A ground-source heat-pump is one that sources its heat from pipes under the ground. Usually water with anti-freeze is circulated through the pipes.

The picture is one of my ground-source heat-pump projects. In 2004 I took a course to get a license to work with refrigerants and it cost hundreds of pounds. In 2008 the license ran out and I would have had to pay another few hundred pounds to keep the license for another four years (who dreams-up these daft schemes). The crazy thing is that the refresher course had nothing to do with actually using refrigerants or their safety, it was all about EU 'gobbledegook' and legislation. Once again, thanks Brit government for landing us with that! I decided the whole thing was stupid and, on principle, abandoned heat-pumps. A cynic might observe that someone is trying to get us to burn more oil and just forget about the planet! None-the-less, heat-pumps are a good idea and I may come back to them once I have finished everything else I'm working on.

Because ground-source heat-pumps get their heat from under the ground, the important thing to remember is that they can be used all year round as the soil temperature remains around 7 deg C in the UK at depths below about 1m. The heat from a ground-source heat-pump can be used to pre-heat water before it goes to a central-heating boiler, alternatively it may be used for under-floor or blown-air heating systems.