The heat pump is a great piece of technology, being used to provide heated air and also cooling air in a home or office. So this begs the question, is the heat pump really that good and is it a green appliance. A Clapham Plumber knows how a heat pump operates. Sadly it looks like the answer is No. This is not the fault the heat pumps alone, but that they are powered by electricity. The snag is that the power taken to run them is supplied from coal, oil and gas fired generating plants. So not only are they using fossil fuel but they are burning it in a not very efficient way. By the time it reaches you it has dropped in efficiency by 20% This makes the carbon footprint 17 which in ecological terms is massive! But being super efficient all a heat pump can do is try and drop the electricity carbon footprint to something that is comparable to natural gas. Clapham Plumbers can install heat pumps. You could purchase the electricity you use however from a greener retailer or make your own using photovoltaic solar panels (PV) these heat pumps suddenly become a different option. PV panels cannot be used in a direct way as they tend to work better in summertime when the pump isnt working, plus they cannot generate the electrical starting load required to start up the pump. You will be able to cover the running costs of the heat pump by retail your voltaic electricity back to the national grid, and you dont need a massive amount of panels to do this. If you do this, then your heating costs are zero.