Double installation brings benefits of renewable heating to Norfolk home and business

The owners of a physiotherapy practice are enjoying the benefits of renewable heating both at work and at home thanks to two heat pump installations by Finn Geotherm. The heat pumps have been installed in a new eco-conscious commercial building and a 300 year old farmhouse, showing the breadth of projects that are suitable for heat pump systems.

Stephen and Liz Ashford built Park Physiotherapy Clinic near Dereham in 2011. The 200m² purpose-built practice was designed with environmentally friendly features such as triple glazing, solar panels and a heat recovery system. These complement a Lämpöässä V10.5 ground source heat pump with integral 420 litre thermal store installed by Finn Geotherm. The heat pump is fed by 500m of collector loop laid in an adjacent field, providing heating throughout via an underfloor system and all hot water.

Liz Ashford said:

“The physiotherapy centre has an A rated Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) and we wanted to continue our focus on the environment when it came to heating. The clinic has to be warm for clients and ground source was ideal as it provides constant, steady state heating that we leave to run on its own.”

Having completed the installation at Park Clinic, Stephen and Liz faced a dilemma at their five bedroom farmhouse, which had an inefficient oil-fired boiler, supplemented by an AGA and wood burning stoves.

Stephen Ashford explains:

“We went from warm premises with efficient, environmentally friendly heating during the day, returning home to a draughty farmhouse in the evenings. There are so many myths around whether you can heat older, larger properties with a heat pump – particularly those with a D or E EPC rating such as ours – so we were unsure if it would be the right choice. However, we trusted Finn Geotherm and we’d already been very impressed with the ground source installation at the physio practice.”

Finn Geotherm installed a Lämpöässä VM14 ground source heat pump with integral 480 litre thermal store at the Ashford’s farmhouse. 900 metres of collector loop were installed in the meadow behind the property. Existing old radiators were replaced with new efficient ones.

Stephen sums up:

“Our farmhouse is now warm throughout, whereas before we had a few warm rooms and the remainder of the house was very cold in winter. The ground source heat pump works much better than we’d ever hoped was possible. These two projects go to show the great potential of heat pumps in both new and retrofit applications.”