Mechanical Ventilation with Heat Recovery (MVHR) provides the best possible air quality without wasting energy. It filters dust, pollen, and airborne pollution from the air you breathe, and it warms to almost room-temperature using recovered energy you’d otherwise waste. Lingering odours, damp and mould are a thing of the past. Smart MVHR systems linked to heat pumps can even add energy efficient climate control to future-proof your home.
The more you look into the benefits, the more you realise MVHR is the only way to ventilate a modern, low-energy building. The health and comfort benefits outweigh the energy savings, and those can be considerable when combined with sealed building fabric. The question is not whether you need MVHR, it’s do you need the best MVHR or will something mediocre do? The answer is – how long do you plan to live in the property?
For instance, to correctly ventilate a 200m2 property, your MVHR will need to supply and extract almost 2 million cubic metres of air, every year for the life of the building. That’s 4 million cubic metres of contaminated air moving through a box in your plant room or utility. Enough air to fill 1500 Olympic swimming pools. When designed, installed, set-up, and maintained correctly, a quality MVHR should do that for decades with minimal intervention, but it’s a lot to ask from something mediocre.
As a rule of thumb, the earlier you plan the system, or more specifically, plan the building to accommodate the system, the better the specification, and the more you think about future maintenance from the outset, the longer it’ll last, the quieter it’ll run, the easier it’ll be to look after, and the less it’ll cost you to own over the longer term.
A complete MVHR system needs more physical space than all the other Mechanical & Electrical plant combined. Your hot water cylinder, heating system, plumbing and electrics. Where you put the exterior terminals can dictate where the machine can go. You shouldn’t push or pull air near a busy road, a close neighbour, a chimney or flue, or even your air source heat pump. And the machine itself is under 20% of the whole system. It’s the rest you need to plan for, the duct distribution system, ideally as you’re designing the structure of the building so it can be accommodated efficiently. There’s more to think about than leaving a gap in the plant room and specify pozi joists. Quite often the MVHR can’t even go in the plant room, because other hot plant can contribute towards overheating via the MVHR. The optimal time to plan MVHR is RIBA Stage 2 or 3, not after Stage 4 when you’re already on site.
MVHR is only part of your ventilation strategy too. To comply with Part-F you also need openable windows that meet the purge requirements, or a mechanical system that achieves the same result. Fire protection, Radon levels, NOx pollution, and vaulted ceilings all need considering early. The MVHR needs to comply with Part-L (conservation of energy) too, and may form part of your Part-B (fire safety) strategy too. But the new Part-O is the latest challenge, because the MVHR may need to provide more ventilation if not Active Cooling as part of your overheating strategy too. All these things require more space than you have, so if they’re not planned in advance you may struggle to adapt things later.
At Solarcrest we aim to provide the architect with appropriate mechanical consultancy when they’re designing the building so it can be MVHR-compatible from the outset. We can also help with airtightness, overheating, and renewable energy strategies at the right time too, potentially before you even submit the planning application. As things progress we create a BIM/Revit model of the building before starting MVHR design. That way we can design in native 3D and install the system virtually to check it fits before you order the frame, the joists or the steels. Retrofitting MVHR later always involves unnecessary cost and compromises.
Airflow recommend Solarcrest because they know their premium systems will be specified, installed, and then set-up correctly. Established in 2009 our early work included R&D projects funded and scrutinised by DECC, the NEA, ERDF, Technology Strategy Board, Local Authorities and Registered Social Landlords. Since then we’ve delivered hundreds of successful Airflow MVHR projects for the UK’s most prestigious custom/self-builds, we’ve earned almost 200 five-star reviews from architects, contractors, and clients alike, and we were the first ventilation provider to attain government Trustmark status.
But the main reason to consider Solarcrest is our guarantee. If you’re a Platinum customer we’ll cover everything for 5-years. All materials, all labour, total compliance, and as-constructed performance. You’re effectively buying peace of mind.
