Milestone: 50 Hot Water Heat Pumps!

12 May 2026

By Peter Lawson and Gavin Gilchrist

You may think hot water is a bit of a dull subject - but for those of us helping households cut power bills and carbon emissions, hot water is almost as exciting as rooftop solar. (And something we’ll be covering at our next Solar and Battery Information Night next Thursday - see below!)

After all, producing hot water uses around one third of a household’s electricity, so if we can cut that with new high efficiency heat pumps, it’ll save a fortune.

It’s now three years since Inner West Community Energy launched our hot water heat pump service. We’d been getting questions from the community about this new technology, while at the same time both the federal and state governments announced rebates for the replacement of old electric hot water units and gas units. So we jumped in, did our research, found a reliable installer in Same Day Hot Water, and started promoting our service.

Today, we’ ve installed over 50 hot water heat pumps.

Our second system was for Carmen Jarrett of Leichhardt (pictured below). Carmen says she loves the fact that the stainless steel tank is made in Australia and has a 25-year warranty. She’s had nothing but seamless operation, with free hot water powered by her solar PV. Carmen is planning to get off gas this year whilst undertaking a kitchen upgrade.

Sue, also from Leichhardt, was another of our first installations. “One of the real benefits for me was going all electric; the gas supply charge was about 70% of every bill, so that was a straight-up cost saving!”

Sue says our process was easy. ‘Knowing that both the models and the installer had been vetted was huge,” she says. “I would probably still be researching different models trying to work out the best option without that guidance. Install took less than a day, the rebate was organised for me, and the pump sits in the garden reliably making hot water.”

The costs and benefits of hot water heat pumps will be on the agenda for our next Solar and Battery Information Night at Gasoline Pony wine bar, Marrickville, Thursday, May 28, starting at 7pm. Get there at 645, grab a drink and head to the rear courtyard. Wear something warm!

We’ll supply the pizza.

It’s a free event but please register here.