An environmentally-friendly form of home-heating has made its way to New Zealand and it could save you "hundreds" on your winter heating bills.
Geothermal heating warms homes by using heat that is trapped under the Earth's surface.
Experts say New Zealand's cold, damp houses are in desperate need of it.
Last year Murray Grossmith and his family experienced their first New Zealand winter.
But living in a typical cold, damp Kiwi house made his family sick - with his two month old daughter rushed to hospital with bronchiolitis.
“We pulled out the bed to find that there was all this black mould behind. And that definitely attributed considerably to her being rushed into hospital,” says Mr Grossmith.
Now, building a new house, he is opting for an eco-friendly central heating system, that is new to New Zealand, but is proving popular overseas.
Developed in Scandinavia 30 years ago, the geothermal heating system draws on heat from the Earth.
“These kind of shallow trench systems, we're really using energy that's been stored in the ground from the sun shining on it over the summer,” says hydrologist Zeb Etheridge.
A series of pipes are laid two metres underground, and filled with a special fluid which absorbs much of the 15 degrees of latent heat trapped underground.
A heat pump is used to boost the heat to the desired temperature, and circulate it around the house.
Geothermal heating is seen as an eco-friendly alternative for kiwi homes.
“Our energy is limited in the South Island particularly, no natural gas, so this is the cheapest energy source for being able to heat a home or a commercial building,” says Central Heating New Zealand’s Lyall Smith.
Using 1 unit of electricity to get 3 units of heating back from the environment, geothermal heating is also seen as cost-effective, in the long-term.
It costs an eye-watering $30,000 to set up in a house, but once that is done it only costs around $700 a year to run.
And while the Grossmiths are battening down for another chilly Canterbury winter, they are looking forward to a European answer for an age old Kiwi problem.
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