Shower manufacturer Mira Showers is delighted to announce that it has contributed its innovative new Mira HeatCapture Waste Water Heat Recovery System (WWHRS) to Bellway’s Future Home at Energy House 2.0 (EH 2.0) project, to help accelerate the UK housing sector’s race to carbon net zero.
Residential housebuilder Bellway has created ‘The Future Home’ within Energy House 2.0, a unique £16 million research facility at The University of Salford. EH 2.0 has been partly funded by the European Regional Development Fund and is the largest test and research facility which focuses on fuel-efficient technologies. In anticipation of the Government’s Future Homes Standard in 2025, ‘The Future Home’ is an experimental eco-house built to trial low-carbon technologies.
Built to 2025 standards, this trailblazing home has been designed to generate significantly less carbon than homes that are currently being constructed. Construction of The Future Home had its official launch in January 2023, with live trials beginning in February.
The chamber can replicate most of the world’s climate conditions including wind, rain, snow and solar radiation, ensuring that the home will be tested in temperatures ranging from minus 20°C to plus 40°C. To determine the most efficient methods of operating a home, The Future Home will test a variety of new technologies including wet radiators, infrared panels and underfloor heating.
Committed to supporting specifiers and new property developers in their bid to reduce their carbon footprints, Mira Showers has provided its innovative Mira HeatCapture to the Energy House 2.0 project. Mira HeatCapture is a pioneering Waste Water Heat Recovery System (WWHRS) that utilises the heat energy from shower waste water to increase the efficiency of a domestic heating system. By recovering the heat energy from bathroom waste water, the boiler will apply less energy to heat water as the required heat rise has been reduced.
Hot water demand has recently been added to the Standard Assessment Procedure (SAP) regulations for 2025. Mira HeatCapture helps specifiers and new property developers ensure building projects are regulation compliant from the onset. Tested and certified by WRAS, KIWA, BRE as well as being SAP registered, Mira’s WWHRS has undergone rigorous testing and validation to ensure its performance, quality and longevity meet the high standards the brand has built its reputation upon.
In addition to the Mira HeatCapture WWHRS, EH 2.0 is trialling other technologies including a smart system that can control each radiator or zone individually, the UK’s first roof-mounted air source heat pump, double and triple glazing and a photovoltaic inverter that converts solar radiation into electricity. Sensors located around the house will measure the difference between the energy it generates and the energy it loses in different climates. They will also gauge the comfort of the home.
Commenting on the project, Jamie Bursnell, Group Technical and Innovation Manager for Bellway, said: “The Future Home and the wider Energy House 2.0 project will pioneer new ways to build homes, as well as teach us how we can live in a more environmentally-friendly and cost-conscious way. We have collaborated with many of our suppliers to bring together a wide variety of innovations that can reduce the carbon emissions generated by our homes. The testing will teach us more about which are most effective in varying climate conditions.”
Jamie Bursnell continued, “In addition to limiting carbon emissions, we understand that people who buy our homes will be conscious of their energy bills. How we manage the cost of running the home will therefore be an important component of the research.”
Marcus Hudd, Senior Product Manager at Mira Showers, said ‘We are delighted to be collaborating with Bellway and The University of Salford on this innovative project, designed to help UK housebuilders meet their energy efficiency targets. Results from the study will be fed back into our product development programmes to refine future technologies.’
Testing at Energy House 2.0 began in February 2023, with the first results due later this year. The results produced will influence the future of housebuilding, helping to support both the UK and the European Union’s goal of achieving net zero by 2050.
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