I just wanted to say a special thank you to you for your support with these events. I have really enjoyed working with you and think I have learnt a lot as well. Even though we had the coronavirus come in and upset our plans we managed to turn it around and host two great online meetings which are very different to others available at the moment. I hope we can work together again soon.
Lucy Glynn, Switch2
Heat Pump E-Learning Portal - now live and lovely!
http://heatpumpstraining.org/
We were delighted to work with Themba Technology, Adecoe, GeoScience and QSA Partners over the summer of 2015 to coordinate and deliver the series of heat pump roadshows on behalf of the Department of Energy and Climate Change. These free one-day training courses were designed to help potential heat pump customers in both the domestic and non-domestic sectors – such as businesses, developers and housing providers - understand how heat pumps can deliver lower energy costs, greater comfort and better buildings. We delivered 15 training courses in just 4 weeks to over 300 people (which is no mean feat!) - but still of course there were lots of people who were unable to attend (quite a few just didn't turn up on the day - we've written about that on a previous blog too!).
In response to this, we've transformed the face-to-face training modules into e-learning modules which are now available through a training portal at http://heatpumpstraining.org - and it's now live and ready for you all to use and share!
There's two routes through the e-learning (as this wee diagram shows) depending on whether you're interested in domestic or 
non-domestic heat pumps. The portal also hosts an array of case studies, a very handy glossary and links to other useful sites and resources.
There's some great headlines from the face-to-face training - and we're hoping the online training will be just as well received! Over three-quarters of the trainees completed a feedback form, and of those 100% were either satisfied or very satisfied with the training overall (and when asked to rank individual parts of the training, there was a 94% satisfaction rate).
We succeeded in attracting a wide range of trainees to the events: 41% from social housing, local authorities and private housing developers, 23% from the non-domestic sector, schools and universities, and 23% consultants and assessors who will use the information to advise their clients (the other 13% was made up of the supply chain).
We also asked trainees to give a score of 1 to 10 of how likely they were to specify/install heat pumps before and after the training. Taking the supply chain out of the equation, this rose for those in the domestic sector from 5.9 to 7.4 and from 5.4 to 7.8 in the non-domestic sector - a rise of 1.5 and 2.4 points respectively. DECC will be recontacting some of the trainees in 12 months time to see if any of their aspirations have borne fruit!
We're keen of course for as many people as possible to use the e-learning so PLEASE have a look at the site, try the training and help us spread the word! If you've got thoughts or comments then drop me a line at rachael.mills@se-2.co.uk - we'd love to hear what you think!