ACR Journal

August | September 2020 HEAT PUMPS 40 Training strategy outlines route to 'green recovery' Daikin aims high with Altherma 3 WS Volume 6 No.5 The Heat Pump Association (HPA) has launched a training strategy that lays out how the heating industry needs to transform to enable the wider adoption of heat pumps throughout the UK building stock. The HPA believes the upskilling of heating installers provides the potential for long-term job growth at the same time as helping to achieve Net Zero emissions; something that could form an important part of a ‘green recovery’. The strategy contains five steps for how a plumbing and heating engineer can be trained to meet the new challenges faced in trying to achieve the UK goal of a zero carbon future, and recommending to government that they support a training voucher scheme for the first 5,000 installers to go through the new course. It comes at the same time two industry-wide consultations are published on qualification criteria for training courses. Jobs potential Graham Wright, Chairman of the HPA, said: “The Committee on Climate Change has made clear that we need to move to heat pumps taking over from gas boilers as the default replacement heating system within the next 10-15 years. This is ambitious, but entirely achievable if we move now to retrain and up-skill a market that already exists of around 120,000 existing heating engineers. The role of installers cannot be underestimated in decarbonising heat. The strategy we are launching, together with the consultations on qualification criteria released earlier, are key steps towards achieving this and provide the potential for green jobs as we look to recover from the current crisis.” Daikin belives that its new Altherma 3 WS heat pump is a key move towards providing apartment buildings with renewable energy amidst the growing demand for living space in urban areas. The Altherma 3 WS operates together with a communal air source heat pump (EWYT-B) and Daikin says that the synergy between the two in high-rise buildings allows heat losses to be greatly reduced as well as minimising overheating risks thanks to the highly ešcient thermal distribution at near ambient temperature The system consists of a network of heat pumps connected to a common central water loop. In each apartment there is an Altherma 3 WS unit – a high ešciency in-apartment water-to-water heat pump with an integrated domestic hot water cylinder. The Altherma 3 WS has a footprint of just 597x666mm and can be connected to any type of emitter. Patrick Crombez, General Manager Daikin Europe Heating and Renewables, said: “The use of renewable energy sources in collective application is restricted due to practical concerns such as limited space and sound restrictions. The Daikin Altherma 3 WS is an innovative heat pump that takes these restrictions into account. It is a silent application that fits the apartments of the future perfectly. "It is our mission to have a heat pump in every European home in order to fulfill the sustainability needs of tomorrow. We are now also able to o¤er a solution for apartment buildings.” The training strategy paper, 'Building the Installer Base for Net Zero Heating', can be found at: www.heatpumps.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Building-the- Installer-Base-for-Net-Zero-Heating_02.06.pdf