Heat pumps are a low-cost and efficient way to heat your home, and if you know how to make your heat pump work smarter, hot harder, you can save on your energy bills.
Checklist for running your heat pump wisely
- Make sure it’s clean — Just like cleaning the filter in your dishwasher or washing machine can help it run more efficiently, cleaning the filter inside your heat pump can make a real difference to how well it works. You should give your removable filter a good clean with a vacuum cleaner or warm water once a month during winter. You can always clean them more frequently if they’re particularly dirty.
- Know your temperatures — How do you get a warm, dry home without churning through power? There is a middle point that'll help you with both. Set your heat pump temperature to 18 degrees or above to help fight damp and mould, but below 21 degrees to save on power. The higher the temperature, the more energy the heat pump will use, so anywhere between 18 and 21 is the sweet spot.
- Spend more time on your couch — It might sound obvious, but heat pumps use the most energy when they’re getting a room up to a set temperature. So spending more time in the space your heat pump is in will help you make the most of the energy you’re using. Often, that’s in the living room, which is also conveniently where our couches, TVs, and magazines live. You can close the doors to any rooms you don’t use too.
- Don’t run your heat pump constantly — A lot of people believe that keeping a heat pump running 24/7 is an efficient, cost-effective way to heat their home. But in fact, that idea is actually a myth. When you do that, you’re actually using more energy and losing more energy overall, so it’s much better to just run your heat pump when you’re at home. Doing that will also save you money on your electricity bill.
- Use a timer — If your heat pump has a timer, you can set it to turn on just before you get home or before you wake up in the morning. Doing that also means you’ll be less tempted to crank the heat pump at a high temperature when you get home to a cold house, or wake up in one.
- Insulate your home and block draughts — Making sure your home is properly insulated will mean your heat pump won't have to work as hard and you won’t pay as much in bills each month. You can stay even cosier by installing thermal curtains which keep more heat in the room, or by putting draft stoppers at the bottom of your doors to minimise any heat that might escape through the cracks.
- Get to know the settings — You can fine tune the way you run your heat pump by making the most of its settings. Use the timer to warm the room just before you get home and switch off when you don't need it. Setting the fan to ‘auto’ mode will let the pump optimise its fan speed and only set it to 'low' if you really need it to be quiet — this will reduce the efficiency for the unit and increase your power bill.