Mixergy Cube X Commercial trial with Birmingham City Council to Combat Fuel Poverty
Key Success
A simpler and more convenient smart hot water solution for retrofit projects which can’t accommodate a G3 installation.
In the ground floor flats in the tower blocks in Birmingham, it was not possible to get a safety overflow pipe out, so we needed to create an open-vented solution to bring the technology to tenants on the ground floors.
Birmingham City Council is our technology partner, so we are able to listen to their needs and create products to solve their problems.
These are the first installations of Mixergy Cube X in the UK.
Overview of project
Following the successful installation of the Mixergy X smart hot water cylinder in 690 social housing properties, Birmingham City Council is the first local authority in the UK to install the Mixergy Cube X as part of a commercial trial to support its fuel poverty initiatives. The Mixergy X cylinders are already set to save the Council up to 80 tonnes a year on its hot water carbon emissions and a combined total of over £120,000 in hot water bills. The Mixergy Cube X is an open-vented smart hot water solution with a small footprint, is lightweight and is easy to install. The perfect solution for social housing retrofit, it is particularly suitable for high rise flats as it does not need a discharge pipe or expansion vessel, meaning there is no requirement for G3 Building Regulation for the installation. As its name suggests, Mixergy Cube X is square, allowing it to be installed in small areas. It can absorb and retain large amounts of heat energy, heated using direct electric immersion heater, and will also work with solar PV using the Mixergy Solar Diverter. It comes with smart controls and features. Self-learning can be controlled using the Mixergy app for scheduling and can be integrated with smart tariffs for even more savings on tenants’ energy bills. Housing providers will have access to a welfare dashboard that shows the hot water temperatures and the health of the vessels. It can also carry out auto-cleansing cycles and remote diagnostics for Legionella, removing the need for physical checks for further cost savings.
“Steve Morris Managing Director of Legionella and Fire Safe Services said: The Mixergy Cube X is something new to the market. We are very proud to be part of installing the first ones in the UK. They are far simpler to install in relation to the G3 regulations, which enables us to be able to cause less disruption to the tenants and still get good performance.
I’ve been in the plumbing and heating industry for over 30 years and this is one of the best products that has come onto the market. It gives so many benefits not only to the tenant but also to local authority contractors like us.
There is a small cost increase on the Cube X, but there are so many advantages in relation to the installation and reducing the legionella checks it will pay for itself within two and a half years, which we think will be fantastic moving forward.”