CeP plasterboard radiator (carbon electric paint)

[Quacks]

Hi there,

Does anyone have any experience/reviews of CeP plasterboard radiator system? Refurbishing a small mid-terrace house, only 3.5m wide by 9m long, with no heating system at all at present. Visited Ecovolt's showroom to see the system - carbon electric paint is applied to normal or insulated plasterboard, connects to 24V transformer (max 4 panels per transformer) and uses 350 watts per square metre.

Although derelict for 2 years, the house is warm and dry with no heating system at all, and is so small that I don't want to lose any wall space to radiators. Was considering underfloor heating on the ground floor, but this plasterboard system seems like a good option in theory. The walls, internal floors, and roof of the house will be newly/fully insulated.

Any experience/reviews of the CeP system would be much appreciated.

 

[Leo]

Interesting system, but 350W per square metre isn't going to deliver a lot of heat. Any idea of cost per sqm?

To install this system, you do need to add another isolated layer on top of your existing walls. The plasterboard layer supporting the paint needs to sit over electrodes spanning the heated area. So it will take some space from all rooms, though perhaps just 20-25mm unless you're replacing the existing plaster. I don't see full installation specs online anywhere as they suggest is must be professionally installed.

I love their comment on one of the main advantages they're pushing:

Radiant heating doesn't dry the air, like traditional types of heating.

Ah, traditional systems here use radiators....so radiant heat... The difference with this system is they use your wall as the radiator.

Do you know what the energy requirement of the building is? This might be an option in a very well insulated space, but impractical and very expensive to run in larger or less well insulated buildings. How much of the generated head will simply conduct out through the walls? A typical small gas boiler might be around 15kW, to achieve the same heat output from this system would mean covering over 40 square meters of wall surface. For your space though your heating requirements may be lower.

The other forms of electric heating (storage / convection) are close to 100% efficient, so these cannot offer anything in that regard. So per deliverd kWh of heat energy, electricity will always be considerably more expensive than other sources. There's an argument that a solar PV system with local battery technology could power such a system from electricity generated on-site, but the time we use heating most also coincides with the time we get the lowest levels of solar energy.