Ecocent Hot Water Systems

The ESP Ecocent range of Air Source Heat Pump (ASHP) based water heaters are the industry leaders. Innovative design founded on experience, quality of materials, coupled with attention to detail -all essential ingredients in an Earth saving product. 

The Ecocent MEV-EAHP Hot Water and Ventilation System is a unique product that has been tested and approved by the Building Research Establishment for inclusion in the Government Approved SAP Software which is the mandatory system used to calculate property SAP Ratings and Energy Performance Certificates (EPCS)

In recent years, developers have often resorted to installing PV and Solar Hot Water Panels to achieve compliant SAP ratings on new build properties, the ECOCENT MEV-EAHP can help achieve a compliant SAP RATING without the need for either of these systems, which often upset the cosmetics of the property exterior and which rely on a suitable property orientation.

The use of an Ecocent MEV-EAHP Hot Water and Ventilation System will help new build properties achieve compliance of both Part Land F of the Building Regulations, but its use is not limited to new build properties, it is a system that can easily be incorporated in most properties new or old and can dramatically improve energy efficiency and the living environment.

The Ecocent MEV-EAHP combines:

• An unvented hot water cylinder (200ltr-300ltr)
• A MEV ventilation system (extraction for all wet rooms)
• Air source heat pump (internal)
• Waste heat receovery (whilst in hot water production mode)
• Dehumidification

Saves you lots of money

Simply put, the Ecocent is enormously efficient. For every 1 KW of electricity you put in, you get about 3-4KW of energy out! That’s not a typo. If you compare that with say an immersion heater, where every 1 KW of energy you put in you’ll likely get no more than 0.95K back, it’s easy to see how much less power you’ll use with a Ecocent -and how much you’ll save.

Removes condensation and reduced humidity

The Ecocent draws in moist and steamy air from bathroms and kitchens, and while it’s harvesting the energy from that air it removes the water vapor too. So unlike with a traditional bathroom extractor fan, or even an open window, with an Ecocent mildew and mould are things of the past. Not only that but even hot and humid summer days feel better too!

Turn off your boiler!

Because your Ecocent can efficiently supply all your domestic hot water requirements all year round, when you don’t need to heat your house you simply don’t need your boiler turned on. So when the weather warms up, switch the boilers off and stock up on your oil or LPG for winter at cheaper summer prices and save even more!

Sleep peacefully

With an Ecocent as part of you MEV solution, there’s no need for noisy extractor fans that can wake you up when someone uses the bathroom at night. You can also relax in the reassuring knowledge that your household bills are going to be lower!

How does an Ecocent work?

The ASHP part of an Ecocent gently draws ‘waste’ air into its top section through air ducts placed in areas of the house that are likely to carry warm damp air, such as kitchens, bathrooms and utility rooms. We call it ‘waste’ air because its air you’d normally want to get rid of – from steamy baths and showers, boiling pots and pans, that sort of thing. It does this by a low power and extremely quiet fan which blows the air over the fins of a device called the evaporator, which contains a special liquid gas (you might have heard of it before as ‘refrigerant’). As heat always travels from a hot to a cold material, the heat moves from the air to the refrigerant inside the evaporator.

Refrigerant has a really low boiling point, and just a small amount air makes the refrigerant boil – and turn from a liquid into a gas. Using its Ecocent pumps the hot gas through its pipes – which if you have ever used a bicycle pump before you’ll know makes the gas (air) get even hotter. The hotter gas then travels through the coil around the tank (or to a heat exchanger in the Ecocent Energy model) and the heat is transferred again – but this time from the hotter gas to the cool water that you want to heat and use in your bathroom, kitchen, spa etc.

Meanwhile the gas, which is now cooler because the heat has been transferred to the water via a condenser, flows through special pipes which allow gas to expand, reducing its pressure cooling it to the point that it turns back into a liquid. The cooled liquid travels back through to the evaporator where the whole process starts again.

What happens to the air that has had the heat energy and moisture stripped out from it? Well that’s expelled outside, or if you want to cool a particular room or area it can be sent there instead.

The Ecocent mainly uses electricity for two things – to run the fan and the compressor motors, but of course this is added to the ‘free’ energy taken out of the air to make the unit so amazingly efficient. If the air in the room is steamier and warmer – it contains even more energy, so the Ecocent becomes even more efficient. We say you get 4 (and sometimes more) times energy out than you put in because the Ecocent can extract 4 or more times more energy out of the atmosphere than the energy it takes to do so – and this is called its COP (short for Coefficient of Performance).  

We’re not exactly talking new technology here – because this is pretty much how a fridge works. We’re sure you’d be surprised to hear that the fridge in a similar form as we know it now was invented in the same year as the Battle of Trafalgar – in 1805! We’ve taken that same principle and added one extra stage – instead of taking the heat out of the inside of the fridge and dumping it to the atmosphere, the Ecocent takes the heat out of the atmosphere and channels that heat into your water. Simple, proven, highly effective, and very reliable – we bet you’ve had more trouble with your traditional boiler than you have had with your fridge!