Heat-pump hot water systems are a storage tank that use a refrigeration cycle to extract heat from the surrounding air.

They then use a heat exchanger to heat water in an insulated storage cylinder.

Heat pumps are an energy-efficient solution for heating and cooling your home. They work by transferring heat from one place to another using a refrigeration cycle, which involves the following key components and steps:

1. Evaporator: The heat pump contains a refrigerant that absorbs heat from the outside air, ground, or water source. As the refrigerant absorbs heat, it evaporates, turning it into a gas.
2. Compressor: The gaseous refrigerant is then compressed, which increases its temperature significantly. This process requires electricity but uses much less energy than traditional heating systems.
3. Condenser: The hot, high-pressure refrigerant gas is then passed through a condenser coil inside your home. As the refrigerant releases its heat, it condenses back into a liquid. The released heat is used to warm the air or water, which is then circulated throughout your home.
4. Expansion Valve: The liquid refrigerant is then passed through an expansion valve, which lowers its pressure and temperature, returning it to its initial state so the cycle can begin again.

By using this process, heat pumps can effectively transfer more heat energy than the electrical energy they consume, making them an efficient and environmentally friendly choice for heating and cooling your home.

Heat pumps are great value for money. As they are incredibly efficient at heating water, often reducing the cost of water heating by up to 70%.

They also come with government incentives, making them a very affordable and competitive choice for any home owner looking for an energy efficient hot water system.

Households in Western Australia can receive up to a $1000 discount on an eligible hot water system. This discount is commonly known as a rebate or STC incentive.

Other states may have extra conditions where you're required to switch from an old electric or gas hot water system, but in WA, you just need to install a brand new eligible system.

To qualify for these rebates, households must meet specific criteria. The system must be a registered and eligible system, the installing plumber must have a valid and active plumbing license. The new eligible system can't replace a system that has already claimed a rebate within the last 12 months.

Full details and eligibility requirements can be found on the Government of WA website.

Small-scale Technology Certificates (STCs) are financial incentives for homeowners and businesses to install eligible small-scale renewable energy systems, such as solar PV, heat pumps, and solar hot water systems.

Simply put, it's a discount applied to the system's total cost, allowing the end user to purchase a typically more expensive energy-efficient system for less than the true retail value.

Once registered, every eligible system is assigned a preset number of STCs. Typically, these are around 20 for hot water systems, 25 for solar hot water systems, and 60+ for a 6.6kw solar power system. Larger systems with more solar PV panels are worth even more.

Each STC is valued between $35 and $40. The actual value per STC fluctuates between $35 and $40, like a stock. This means the actual value of the rebate can vary.

To keep everything transparent, Urban Future offers a fixed value for your system's rebate, regardless of whether the value is worth less.

For example, the Enviroheat heat pump is worth 20 STCs, so the rebate can be worth between $700 and $800.

Most companies offer $35 (the lowest) and sell the rebate to a 3rd party to make additional profit.

Urban Future currently offers $38.5 per STC, partnering with Greendeal, which offers a fixed rate per STC. This allows us to provide our customer base with better pricing and allow them to benefit from the additional savings.

So now the Enviroheat heat pump rebate with Urban Future at $38.5 per STC would total $771, providing you with a more considerable discount than the average retailer.

To keep it simple, the pricing advertised on all our eligible products will already include the value of the rebate discounted upon purchase.

After installation, you'll be sent a remote link requesting a digital signature via SMS or email, depending on your preference. 

For solar PV installations, the installer may present an app for you to sign on-site.

This essentially signs your rights to the STCs assigned to your system to Greendeal, who will process the rebate, return the value to Urban Future, and recover their loss from the government.

The only rights being signed away are the rights to the STCs for this specific system, which means that no one else can reclaim STCs (rebates) on it again.

If you want to put a 2nd system on the same property and claim the rebate on that system, you will still be able to do so as new STCs are created.

If you want to buy a new house, put a heat pump on it and claim a heat pump rebate, you can do that too. What you can't do is reinstall this exact system somewhere else and reclaim the rebate again.

It is important to note that if you sell the unit second-hand and it is reinstalled, there will be no claimable STCs as they are issued for the unit, not the installation. Once the STCs have been signed away, they have been "consumed" for the purpose of that specific unit.

A frequently asked question is whether to buy a solar hot water system to replace the existing system on the roof, or to convert to a heat pump hot water system. 

Whilst there is comfort in sticking to what you're comfortable with, heat pumps typically end up having lower costs annually than a heat pump when paired with a solar power system.

A heat pump can be set on a timer to run during the day when the solar is running, at 0.6kw per hour it's going to be operating for free. In Winter when the solar isn't working optimally, most of the time it will still be covered. Where as a 2.4kw Solar hot water element would exceed your solar generation significantly.  

As an extra benefit, cheaper installs, not having half a ton on the roof, water dumping in Summer and easier maintenance when required are also considerations why people are moving to heat pumps instead of spending extra to buy solar hot water systems.

At Urban Future we're not locked into any specific brands, there's no secret deals and no club memberships. We source some of the best brands available that meet certain criteria that gets the job done and gives as you and us as minimal headaches as possible.

One such criteria is local support. Stuff can and will go wrong with technology in all fields and sometimes hot water systems are included. The best way around this is with a main office and operations facility with active stock of heat pumps in Perth, or at the very least holding stock of heat pumps in Australia.

All of the brands we offer have local Perth support, a range of features you'd expect to find in a heat pump, like varying operating modes and timer functions.
Some have a few unique features like wifi access, app integration, silent mode or solar connectivity.

The brands we support are:

• The Apricus Heat Pump
• The iStore Heat Pump
• The Emerald Heat Pump
• The Reclaim Heat Pump
• The Envirosun Heat Pump

Choosing between these brands will get you a good quality and locally supported heat pump hot water system providing cheap hot water for your home.