Noise restrictions on heat pumps are to be relaxed in the pursuit of net zero.
Ministers have said they will scrap current rules that block homeowners from installing a heat pump less than a metre from their property’s boundary.
The requirement was introduced because the systems can produce a loud buzzing noise of up to 60 decibels that can annoy neighbours.
Those who complain about noise are wreckers! To the Gulag with them!
Tower blocks are going to be fun!
I of course believe that those who produced this law should have to live next to the heat pumps.
But I’m sure it’ll be those who’re just the meat in the sandwich.
Relax the rules on seismic activity when fracking at the same time? No, thought not. Wankers.
Loud buzzing noise? Heat pumps make fan noises, not buzzing, and 60 dBa is conversational levels. Shut windows will reduce the noise by ~ 30dB, and what sort of weirdo has their windows wide open in the depths of winter?
My neighbour is one of the grumpiest bastards I’ve ever met about noise and he has absolutely no problem with my heat pump even though it’s on his side of the house.
If you live next door to an MP you know what needs to be done. “Yes to the uninformed it might sound like an air raid siren that goes off at 3AM, but it’s actually my heat pump”.
Government imposes rules which must be complied with or punishment will ensue.
Government comes up with crackpot idea that breaks said rules.
Government scraps said rules.
So they can change the rules, but only if it suits them and their agenda………
Recent news regarding those who had spray foam loft insulation put in under that other great government idea, ‘The Green Deal’:
25% of lenders will not offer a mortgage on those properties. Unless you remove it, which cost one bloke £10,000.
Next job is to repeal the laws of physics that make heat pumps less efficient the colder it gets.
(If I buy a genny to make my own electricity when the blackouts come, will the same noise regulations apply?)
Just put the generator in a heat pump casing.
Job done.
Polyurethane spray foam. In a can, B&Q.
Silence is golden.
what sort of weirdo has their windows wide open in the depths of winter
Someone who lives in a modern hermetically-sealed house?
In any case, winter won’t be the problem time as all the people with heat pumps will have their log burners going to save themselves from electricity bills.
Anecdata but I stayed at a holiday home in Wales with a heat pump which was going at times during the night in the summer and kept people in the bedroom nearest it awake.
“Recent news regarding those who had spray foam loft insulation put in under that other great government idea, ‘The Green Deal’:
25% of lenders will not offer a mortgage on those properties. Unless you remove it, which cost one bloke £10,000.”
Was sprayed on loft insulation ever done under a Govt Grant scheme? Cavity wall insulation was (and that can cause its own problems) and loft insulation using fibreglass rolls was, but I’m not sure the spray on stuff was. I think that was the result of private sector chancers going around conning the gullible that it was part of a government scheme, they needed to do it etc etc.
Try and get planning permission for a residential A/C unit in Central London and you will be refused, with much tut-tutting as to its being an environmental scourge. Re-apply, but call it an Air-Sourced Heat Pump, and Bob’s Your Uncle.
60 decibels aint a buzz, its a roar.
About the same as a 4 stroke engine idling.
Jim @ 11.33, It doesn’t explicitly state ‘foam’ loft insulation but it looks as if the supplier would recommend a suitable solution (suitable to the supplier I guess). The Green Homes Grant scheme followed. From Al Beeb:”It is estimated as many as 250,000 homes in the UK have this type of insulation, with much of it installed under the previous government’s Green Homes Grant scheme.
@Tim the Coder
Presumably you spray the foam into the heatpump through all the little holes in the side until the noise stops?
Probably with a final clunk or bang.
Best wear a mask for that due to elf and safety
“Polyurethane spray foam. In a can, B&Q”
You’re sounding like Katie Hopkins there!
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/11/19/west-midlands-town-in-uproar-over-noisy-2-5m-heat-pump/
@Recusant
With the added joy for the rest of the country that ASHP fall under permitted development. Unless they can cool – in which case you need to go through planning.
Of course – the UK spec ones are significantly more expensive than exactly the same unit ordered from overseas, because of the software lock to make them cool-only.
Perfect example of greens cutting their nose off – I’d happily have gone to a heat pump if it could cool too, but the extra hassle meant I went with a new gas boiler at a third of the price
Handy chart that gives some idea of sound equivalents which confirms AtCs comment about 60dB* being conversation level.
How long until the bearing start to go and that noise level creeps up?
https://decibelpro.app/blog/decibel-chart-of-common-sound-sources/
*Strictly speaking dBs need a refence level so talk of 60bB is meaningless.
Well, yes, but if someone was having a convsersation all night – a normal conversation – outside your bedroom window you’d pretty soon insist they move on….
I’m not disagreeing but it is different to a conversation. Because that chops and changes. I grew up in a place where aircon units (this is getting on for ~60 years ago, they weren’t modern efficient…) would be on overnight. it’s a constant drone that you simply get used to – very quickly. If anything, it usefully drowned out the rest of the irregular tropical nocturnal racket.
For clarity, these were normal wall-mounted variety – ie, in the same room you were in.
And d’you know what? I almost always turned the fuckers off and sweated instead. Got more sleep that way. Unbearable fuckers, found in Japan and cheap hotels in the USA.
Bloke in Keighley
Mine cools. Why I got it in the first place.