Electric central heating and hot water

[ch1mp]

Hi all,

i'm doing up a very old house in albano laziale on very little cash

we've just got the financing through to remove an asbestos roof and have solar panels fitted. still up in the air a bit but i'm hoping to get between 5 and 6kwp on there.

this will mean that the incentives pretty much cover the financing and we'll have a nice new roof and lots of free leccie. soooo, the big question is, what is the best way for me to heat this house? i don't want gas in there at all as i want it to be bills free so we can concentrate on paying the mortgage

i've been looking at electric underfloor heating, air to water heat pumps and wet undefloor, electric radiators, tankless hot water systems etc. etc.

the house is roughly 80m2 and will have 2.7m high ceilings once i get them in. it's currently single glazed with crap old windows, i will be replacing these as and when i get the money to do so! the external walls are a bit more than 70cm thick so shoudl provide good insulation.

what do you think is the best and cheapest, easiest to install way to get heating and hot water? ideally i'd need to get a boost in pressure to as the mains pipes are very very old and the pressure is pretty crappy.

any hints of what type of system will be best for me are greatly appreciated, there's a lot of conflicting info out there so any pointers will be great,

thanks.

 

[Fluffster]

If you are sure about 6kwp then get a 5kw invertor to run your system.
If your mains pressure is poor then options of a break tank pumped to an unvented hot water cylinder would be possible.
Underfloor heating is a bit more tricky, I like wet however you need to keep it on most of the day for real heat output. Leccie underfloor has a shelf life however is quicker and more controllable.

If you want total independence then you will need leccie storage at night via batteries which is quite diverse in options.

Do some reading online and go to photo leccie forums to get more info.

Pete

 

[ch1mp]

cheers pete, all the photovoltaic stuff is being taken care of, the way it works over here is we'll get a fixed price per kwh as incentives, plus we zero the leccie bill with what we produce. we should be producing more than we consume pretty easily i think, but that depends on how i tackle the central heating and hot water...

interesting about the electric underfloor having a shelf life, how many years will you realistically get? i'm looking to have as little maintenance and as long a life as poss for everything that goes in obviously. also the power consumption looks to be massive if it's your primary heating with electric underloor. woudl electric radiators consume less?

i'll have a look at the break tank idea, by unvented hot water cylinder do you mean a tank with an immersion heater?

any way to improve pressure and stay tankless?

 

[ch1mp]

ok, everyone i talk too seems to prefer wet, but they then say like the 2 replies on here that you need to leave it on nearly all the time if it's a primary heat source.

is any underfloor good enough as only heat source? i'm only going to need it for nov through to start of march here. so 4 months of the year.

if it IS good enough, what kind of system do you guys recommend for heating the water? will running an instant hot water system be insane for keeping wet underfloor running for that length of time?

what kind of set up would be best? anyone got an idea on my pressure probs too?