Earth Notes: Home Heat Pumps: 2-day Installation Open Letter (2025)

To:

Home heat-pump installations in the UK are happening far too slowly. The UK cannot meet its Net Zero commitments to fixing the climate unless most of the 20 million or so gas boilers in homes already built are replaced by heat pumps before 2050.

Heat pumps can take months to install, in part because of current rules that require permissions in advance rather than notification afterwards, unlike modest solar PV systems. My shiny new installation from Octopus for my small end-of-terrace took 12 years or a few months or a long week, depending on your point of view.

This is annoying at best, but absolutely does not work for distress upgrades, such as an unexpected gas boiler failure in the middle of winter. The easy thing to do is slap another gas boiler in the space of the old one, committing that house to burn gas for another 15 years.

Various start-ups are trying to tackle this such as Adia Thermal and Anzen. At least one of the other major energy suppliers is too: EDF. Solutions elsewhere in the world include loaning a temporary system to homes where the full installation cannot be completed in a few days.

Practice and regulation need to be streamlined to facilitate 2-day retrofits.

Imagine that Octopus and others can roll up on the day that they receive a call from a cold householder, with three sizes of heat pump and some standard pipes and radiators in a van. On arrival, from a LIDAR image of the boiler cupboard and existing parts, and with MCS heat loss calculation inputs taken on the spot, automatically produce a new heating design and layout. Centrally fabricate drop-in replacement pipework to be brought over that day or next morning along with less common parts. Get works started that first day with all equipment options pre-approved. Notify relevant parties (eg DNO, BCO, MCS, Connect Direct) during/after works, and receive a Boiler Upgrade Scheme grant on behalf of the customer before invoicing. A tune-up revisit a week or so later might be needed, turning up temporary power limits on bigger pumps once the DNO is content.

Yours sincerely,