HeatpumpMonitor.org

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HeatpumpMonitor.org is a great initiative to counter the view from some quarters that ‘heat pumps don’t work in normal buildings’ with research and facts. It shows a dashboard of real-world performance data from a modest but ever-increasing list of heat pump installations.

Currently, all the systems listed are in the United Kingdom and most are Air Source Heat Pumps in Retrofit (rather than New-Build) installations – but a recent addition is a certain new-build with a Ground Source Heat Pump.

HeatmpumpMonitor is built on top of emoncms (which I’d be using for internal temperature and humidity monitoring if I hadn’t already gone down the OregonScientific route) and links out to emoncms.org for further detail on each of the installations.

HeatpumpMonitor.org dashboard as of 2022-12-17, sorted by “30 Day COP”

For people already capturing data using a local emoncms installation (such as might run on an emonPi) it’s a simple configuration process to forward that to emoncms.org and publish to the dashboard. Since I’m not using a local emoncms, I run a script (every 2 minutes) to extract the relevant updates from my local InfluxDB database and push those to the emoncms.org API.

Normally, emoncms.org is a chargeable service but the nice folks who run that very kindly waived the fee for inclusion in this dashboard.

Website Blocking on Mobile Networks

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The main broadband connection for Marsh Flatts Farm is currently offline due to trees moving in high winds having damaged the overhead fibre optic ‘cable’ on Aston Lane (again). There’s an automated fall-back to a 4G Mobile Broadband service using the O2 network – which works OK but was blocking access to this website.

Searching for some way to request access to be un-blocked led me to https://www.blocked.org.uk which confirmed that the site was indeed being blocked by the Three and O2 mobile networks – but not by the vast majority of other network operators.

Site blocking report showing active blocks by Three and O2

The ‘blocked’ website provides an easy way to request the blocking to be reviewed and I’m pleased to report that both Three and O2 have removed their blocks, in less than 2 working days – in fact I’m posting this update via the O2 network.