A REGULAR participant at the Ideal Home Show, this year Space Air worked closely with Show House Village designers, Lynch Architects.
The Courtyard House, sponsored jointly by Stewart Milne and Space Air, featured a heat-pump- based multi-split, heating and cooling, climate control system to demonstrate the benefits of residential ac, and to keep the estimated 160,000 visitors cool as they walked around the show home. The Jeld-Wen/Marks and Spencer sponsored Country House incorporated a static display of the Altherma, a new, renewable energy, air source heat pump, space heating and hot water system.

With ac, now a common feature in offices, shops, restaurants, hotels and cars, it is hardly surprising that homeowners are also considering its benefits, There is a school of thought, however, which suggests that increasing residential ac will place an unwanted burden on electricity supplies during the summer, with a consequential rise in environmentally harmful carbon emissions. However it should be acknowledged that modern climate control systems are based on reverse cycle heat pump technology, classified among a number of environmentally beneficial, renewable, low-to- zero carbon technologies – providing instant and highly controllable comfort cooling in the summer but also instant heating in the colder months, at operating efficiencies well in excess of conventional heating systems.

Government figures state that gas, oil and direct electric space heating systems currently represent the highest proportion of residential energy consumption (61%). Heat-pump-based ac systems provide a much needed opportunity to substantially reduce these emissions by approximately 60% compared with direct electric, 28% compared with mains gas and 47% compared with oil-fired systems. These potential carbon emissions advantages far outweigh the additional impact of the limited periods where the equipment would operate in cooling mode.

When it comes to energy consumption for home heating and hot water, government figures put the UK residential total at a staggering 84%. Clearly, changing to low energy light bulbs and switching off electrical appliances helps, but if we are to significantly reduce the carbon footprint of our homes, the use of air-source heat pumps cannot be ignored, says Space Air.

Space Airconditioning

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