Panasonic has launched its new Aquarea Designer software to help contractors with heat pump installations.
The package is designed to allow hvac designers, installers and distributors to identify the correct heat pump for a particular application from Panasonic's Aquarea range, calculate the savings compared to other heat sources and quickly calculate CO₂ emissions.

Marc Diaz of Panasonic said: 'We are all so time-pressured, that any development which can simplify the specification process is welcome. We have designed this new software to be simple and of real benefit to busy engineers. Aquarea Designer is very straightforward to use and is now available as a free download from the online PanasonicProClub website.'

By using Aquarea Designer, Panasonic says that projects can be developed simply and easily, by either using the Quick Design or Expert Design options. Each allows the engineer to build up the project data in a simple step-by-step process and choose to output reports as HTML files or as print outs.

To create the reports project data is input, such as; the heated area, heating requirement, heating flow and return temperatures, climate data and type of hot water tank.

After deciding on the mode of operation of the heat pump, for example whether the requirement is for heating only or heating and cooling, Aquarea Designer will then find suitable heat pumps from the Panasonic range and do all the calculations automatically.

Project files can be saved for reference and if demand changes they can be adjusted (for example if a customer first opted to have separate hot water production and then opts for hot water heating via the heat pump). The user can adjust house metrics, solar data for warm water or recalculate the figures based on the gas/oil demand of the last year and so on.

Aquarea Designer will calculate the project's energy costs in terms of hot water, heating and pumping. It will show the equipment running times and calculate the annual COP (coefficient of performance). It then allows the designer to show clients a comparison with other equipment options such as heating by conventional gas-fired boilers, oil systems, wood, standard electric heating and electric night storage heaters. This compares running costs, initial investment costs and maintenance costs. The comparison can also be made for CO₂ emissions and savings.