Heat pumps - a cool way to heat your home for less. Water heating and space heating account for more than 60 per cent of a home's energy cost which makes them the best place to look for savings. But that's difficult. Conventional electrical heating is already 100 per cent efficient. If you put one kilowatt of electricity into an electric heater, you get one kilowatt of heat out. So, as long as the heat isn't being wasted, most people would assume the only way to make savings is to turn the heater down. Not any more. The eco-friendly home introduces a new type of electrical heating that is actually 375 per cent efficient. The Daikin Inverter heat pump in the eco-friendly home actually pumps out over three times more energy, in the form of heat, than they consume. Impossible? Not at all. The pump simply transfers the heat from somewhere else. They pump warmth from the air outside into the house - hence the term 'heat pump'. Unlike conventional heaters, the power isn't converted into heat, it is only used to power the pump that circulates the liquid through the system. The same principal is at work in your refrigerator. The heat pump in your fridge extracts the warmth from inside the fridge and releases it outside which is why the back of your fridge is warm. And it continues to work even when the inside is colder than the outside. The Daikin heat pump warms the eco-friendly home the same way. Even on bitterly cold days, its heat exchanger unit can extract 'warmth' from cold air outside and transfer it into a heated room, just as your fridge keeps extracting heat from your freezer even when it's below zero. The Daikin heat pump can still warm your home when the air outside is 10 degrees below zero! And best of all, heat pumps can be flicked into reverse to provide cooling in summer. Say air conditioner to most people and they will think of big noisy boxes, but they are a thing of the past. A modern Daikin domestic air conditioner runs as quietly as a desktop fan. At around 32 decibels, it's quiet enough to hear a pin drop. Malcolm Miller from the Daikin suppliers, Absolute Air-conditioning and Refrigeration Limited in Auckland, says the heat pump uses the electricity needed to run a one-bar heater and converts it into the heat output of a four-bar heater. That makes the running costs less than half that of gas or traditional electric heating. Heat pumps cost more to install than conventional electric heaters but they pay for themselves with running costs that are about half those of gas or electric heating and less than a fifth of an LPG heater. Heating in winter, cooling in summer, they also filter the air to remove irritants like pollen and dust -and they work as dehumidifiers. That saves the cost of buying several different units, making a domestic heat pump air-conditioner a very cost effective package for a forward looking homeowner. "It works out at about $200 a year for the average home compared to up to $800 a year for gas or traditional electric heating," he says. The heat pump is also less harmful to the environment. It doesn't produce any carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to global warming. Carbon dioxide and other gas and water vapour emissions are often regarded as a major drawback of solid fuel and gas heating.
Induction cooktops - a cooler kitchenThe eco-friendly home also features an induction cooktop which is probably the biggest breakthrough in cooking since the electric oven. The first time you see one in action, it seems like magic. The cooktop stays cool to the touch even when boiling a pot of water! This is a great safety feature, it's easy to clean and it's also very energy efficient. There is much less wasted energy heating the air in the kitchen which also makes life much more comfortable for the cook. Induction cooktops first found acceptance in commercial kitchens overseas. Executive chefs were quick to appreciate the instant controllability, practicality and efficiency of induction cooking. Induction cooktops use a magnetic field to induce a heating current directly in the base of a suitable pan. The cooktop won't work without a pot on it and sensors switch off elements under dry pots or small objects like spoons. A quality cooktop like the Thermor unit in the eco-friendly home is also faster than gas. It boils water in two minutes compared to seven in a microwave, saving about 40 per cent in energy. To keep air inside the eco-friendly home clean and low in moisture content, an efficient rangehood was installed above the cooker. It's estimated that every year, an average of 4.2 litres of cooking fat is deposited on the cooler surfaces of walls, ceilings and cupboards. The RobinHood rangehood filters steam, cooking fats and kitchen odours. It also incorporates a heat alarm which lets off a warning signal in the event of a fire on the cooktop - not that that's possible with an induction cooktop.
DishwasherAnother breakthrough in the eco-friendly home is the Fisher and Paykel DishDrawer dishwasher. It's the first in the world to have two separate dishwashing drawers and has a five-star energy rating. It lets you wash smaller loads, minimising energy and detergent use and using as little as nine litres of water. You can also do a heavy pot wash at the same time as a delicate glassware load with maximum efficiency and no compromise.
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Everyday electricity
brings light, warmth, comfort, leisure and entertainment into our lives. New
Zealand is doubly lucky that 80 per cent of our electricity comes from renewable
resources such as geothermal and hydro-power stations which reduces our
dependence on non-renewable fossil fuels.
Bio-Cable was supplied by Accord Electrical in Army Bay, Whangaparaoa,
and installed throughout the home by Laser Electrical. The cables carry mains
current to appliances and lighting. considerably less cabling was used in the
eco-friendly home compared to most conventionally wired homes.
