TERRA THERMA, intends to develop a novel fuel-driven heat pump, making use of a Stirling engine as an efficient means of driving the compressor. The major advantage of using this configuration is that it can capture the heat of power generation and provide this as heating energy in addition to the heat delivered by the heat pump. This implies a primary energy efficiency of substantially greater than 100%. No new infrastructure is required as energy can be delivered through any wet central heating system and retrofit to a gas infrastructure will be very simple.

TERRA THERMA will also develop a trenchless radial probe ground loop, utilising the advantages of both vertical and horizontal configurations to produce a low-cost, low impact ground loop. This will enable the average European garden to accommodate a system without costly deep drilling.

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