As cooling and air quality become increasingly important, integrated air-based systems are being considered as a way to manage year-round comfort. These systems can heat, cool, and circulate air around the home, with filtration, humidity management, and fresh-air ventilation potentially integrated into the wider system.
For many UK homeowners, air conditioning still means a wall-mounted unit blowing cold air across a hotel bedroom or office. However, air-based systems can do much more than cool a single room, depending on the design. With heat waves becoming a prominent part of the summer conversation, many homeowners are considering whether they need active cooling.
Many homes, whether recently built or much older, were not designed to cope with overheating or prolonged periods of high temperatures. The effects are often felt most acutely in bedrooms, where noise and security concerns can make opening windows impractical. New-build homes in England are subject to Part O of the Building Regulations, introduced in 2022 to limit unwanted solar gains and ensure excess heat can be removed.
Richard Soper, UK managing director at The Unico System, states that people are starting to say they need cooling. He likens the need for cooling to the advent of air conditioning in cars, where it becomes second nature to have a consistent temperature throughout the journey.
Addressing Cooling Needs
For UK homeowners considering air-based systems, the choice is whether to address individual problem rooms or manage comfort more consistently throughout the building. Either way, for effective cooling, they will want to look beyond the low-cost portable air coolers heavily promoted online. Portable evaporative coolers can provide some local relief but add moisture to the air and become less effective as humidity rises.
Many fixed air-conditioning systems are actually a type of air-to-air heat pump. In cooling mode, they take heat from inside the building and release it outdoors; reversible models can run the process in the opposite direction to provide heating. The simplest form is the familiar hotel-room setup: an outdoor pump serving a wall-mounted or concealed fan unit inside the room.
Multi-split arrangements connect several indoor units to a single outdoor appliance, suitable for homes where only selected rooms need heating and cooling. A central, ducted arrangement typically connects an outdoor heat pump to a concealed indoor air-handling unit, which conditions recirculated air before distributing it through ducts to several rooms or a defined zone.
A well-designed central system can distribute air through several room outlets for gentler, more even coverage. Cooling also removes some moisture from the air, making hot conditions feel less clammy, while closer humidity control can be added through sensors and other equipment.
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Central Systems Offer
A central system can become the principal source of space heating and active cooling, potentially removing the need for radiators or underfloor heating. With the right controls, this extends zoning to cooling as well as heating, allowing comfort levels to be tailored more precisely across the home. The Unico System’s outlets are exceptionally discreet, barely visible, and use aspiration to achieve a maximum temperature difference of 1.2°C between wall-to-wall and floor-to-floor.
In practice, the system will be tailored to the homeowner’s needs and the way they want to use it. A specialist will plan how conditioned air reaches each space, ensuring the ductwork, outlets, and controls work together to provide quiet, even comfort. Involving them early helps integrate the system discreetly into the building design.
A high-quality air-based system should do more than simply reach a given temperature: a good install should maintain comfort without obvious draughts, intrusive noise, or significant hot and cold spots. With the right filter specification, a central system can help remove airborne dust, pollen, and pet dander – improving air quality for everyone, and offering particular value to households affected by allergies.
For a more complete approach, air-based heating and cooling can be designed alongside MVHR. In this situation, the primary climate-control system regulates temperature, while MVHR removes stale air and supplies filtered outdoor air as part of the home’s ventilation strategy.
Designing for Open Plan
Air-based heating and cooling systems can be designed to work effectively with open-plan homes, as long as the system is properly designed with the size and layout of the room in mind. Very big open-plan schemes may require quite a few outlets to ensure an evenly cooled or heated space. The positioning of the system’s outlets should be considered as part of the overall architectural and interior design, rather than decided once the scheme is complete.
Like any heating or cooling system, an air-based climate control system needs regular maintenance to ensure it operates as expected and required. Any filters in the system will need to be cleaned, and if the set-up involves an MVHR system, that will require filter changes. Most domestic air-based climate control systems operate pretty quietly, as long as the ductwork has been properly sized and installed.
When specifying an air-based system, it’s essential to ask the supplier about the room-by-room heat losses and cooling loads informing the design, the location of the outdoor unit, air handler, ducts, outlets, and returns, and the filtration and maintenance requirements. The system designer must establish exactly what is integrated and how the different controls will work together to provide a comfortable and efficient heating and cooling solution.
The system designer will consider the specific needs of the homeowner and the building to create a tailored solution. This includes assessing the building’s insulation, windows, and other factors that affect its energy efficiency. By taking a full approach, they can create a system that provides optimal comfort and energy efficiency.
