Cornish social housing provider Coastline Housing has partnered with local ground source heat pump manufacturer Kensa Heat Pumps to replace inefficient night storage heaters with sustainable ground source heating in 12 bungalows housing older residents in Constantine.

The installation at Wheal Vyvyan features the first "micro district ground source heat network" system architecture of its kind in Cornwall and is the first project of this type to have been undertaken by Coastline Housing.

A ground source heat pump works by harnessing heat energy from the ground and compressing this to provide heating and domestic hot water to a property. The heat energy is collected via a "ground array" which on the Constantine estate consisted of six boreholes carefully drilled into the land surrounding the properties.

Kensa installed a 3kW Shoebox ground source heat pump into each bungalow on the estate. Developed by Kensa, the Shoebox is the smallest and quietest ground source heat pump on the market, designed and manufactured at Kensa’s facility in Mount Wellington Mine, Truro.

The ground source heat pumps provide 100 per cent of each property’s heating and hot water needs and are expected to save tenants somewhere in the region of £300 per year compared to the previous electric Economy 7 systems.

Wendy, who has been in her property for 18 months, said: “The heat pump is much more economical, I noticed a difference straight away. I was often cold with the night stores, especially in the morning, but baking hot during the night. This is much better and the hot water cylinder fits nicely in my attic, freeing up valuable cupboard space.”

Chris, who has lived at Wheal Vyvyan for nearly eight years, added: “The night storage heaters were a waste of space, they didn’t stay warm. The heat pump heats up the house quickly and is easy to control using the thermostat. They did a great job drilling the boreholes; I wasn’t sure how they would get into such small spaces, but even though the drill was large, you can hardly tell where they’ve been.”

Due to this success, Coastline is considering undertaking ground source installations on a larger scale to provide more energy efficient homes for its customers, and is currently working with Kensa to scope out a second ground source heat pump project in Cornwall.