Roof-mounted air source heat pump to guide route to net zero

The roof-mounted heat pump, said to be the first in the UK, will be tested in the Future Home, Bellway’s experimental eco house at Salford University.

Air source heat pumps are expected to replace natural gas boilers in most homes when they are phased out from 2025. They are already installed in a number of new homes, where they are usually fitted to, or adjacent to, an exterior wall where they dominate a property’s external appearance and take up outdoor space.

The Future Home is being built by Bellway inside a climate-controlled chamber at the university as part of its £16m Energy House 2.0 research project, which is part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund. The home will test low-carbon technologies and their impact on the cost of living.

Bellway has engineered the house to support the 200kg air source heat pump within the roof space. A second unit will be fitted to an external wall to enable comparisons between the two.