Your Home Generates Solar All Day.Your Gas Boiler Ignores Every Bit of It.
Thermal Dawn connects the two, storing heat when power is cheapest and delivering it through your existing radiators and underfloor circuits, all evening.
Works with your existing radiators and underfloor heating. Australian-made thermal store. No gas, no peak-rate pain.
Installed and running in Victorian homes.
A Standard Heat Pump Still Leaves You Exposed
Swapping a gas boiler for a standard hydronic heat pump is a step forward. But it doesn't solve the fundamental problem: your home needs heat most at dawn and dusk, exactly when electricity prices peak.
A standard heat pump draws from the grid during those expensive morning and evening hours. You've escaped gas, but you're still paying premium rates every time the temperature drops at night.
Thermal Dawn is different. Our system charges when power is cheapest, a free midday window, your own solar, or late-night off-peak, then delivers that stored warmth through your radiators and underfloor heating all evening, with the compressor off through the expensive hours.
What This Actually Means for Your Bills
Two things drive what heating costs you: the price of the fuel, and the hour you buy it. Gas gives you no control over either.
Gas prices have risen over 40% in five years and aren't coming back down. Every year you stay on gas is another year paying for an energy source with nowhere to go but up. A Thermal Dawn system moves your heating onto the cheapest energy on your tariff, for years to come.
In Hawthorn the gas meter is off the house, so the daily supply charge went with it. What the heating costs there now depends on when it charges, not on what gas does next.
Your battery wasn't built for heating
You've probably already noticed it. Run the air conditioner for an hour and watch the battery drop off a cliff. Heating and cooling are the biggest loads in your home by a long way, and a home battery is sized for the lights, the fridge and the telly.
Now picture electrifying a 30kW gas boiler. Even through an efficient heat pump, that's more power than most home batteries can deliver, let alone sustain for an evening. You'd flatten it before dinner was over, with nothing left for the rest of the house.
Thermal Dawn stores the energy as heat instead, in a store built for that one job and nothing else. No lithium, and it isn't competing with the rest of your house for what's left in the tank.
| Home battery (lithium) | Thermal Dawn | |
|---|---|---|
| Stores | Electricity | Heat & cooling, directly |
| Conversion losses | Electricity → heat, lossy at every step | Solar → heat, stored as heat |
| Storage made in | Mostly imported | Australia |
A battery is a fine way to run your lights and power points. But heating and hot water are where the big, predictable load sits, and that's exactly what thermal storage does best, for less. Some homes end up with both; if you're choosing one first, this is the one that pays back your heating bill.
Works with Your Solar.Works Without It Too.
Thermal storage is often explained as a way to use your own solar, and it is. But the thing it really does is buy energy when it's cheap and spend it when it's expensive. Your roof is one source of cheap energy. It isn't the only one.
No solar at all
The store charges on off-peak rates overnight or in the middle of the day, then heats your home through the expensive evening peak. You're still buying your heat at the cheapest rate on your tariff instead of the dearest.
Free midday windows
Retailers are now handing out free power windows, typically around 11am to 2pm, to soak up the midday solar glut. That is exactly the window a thermal store is built to charge in, and it's free fuel whether or not you own a panel.
A small or ageing array
Plenty of homes have 2 or 3kW that barely covers the base load in winter. The store takes whatever your roof gives it and tops up from the cheapest rate available for the rest. Nothing is wasted and nothing is required.
Solar coming later
Install now, add panels whenever you're ready. The system picks up the extra generation automatically, so the order you do things in doesn't cost you anything.
If you've been told thermal storage only makes sense with a big array, that's worth a second opinion. We'll model your actual tariff at the assessment and show you exactly where the savings come from in your case.
Same Pipes. Smarter Heat Source.
The same thermal storage that powers your heating can also deliver hot water and summer cooling, maximising your use of dawn solar and cutting even more off your energy bills.
Charge on solar
Your solar, a free midday window, or late-night off-peak power drives the Thermal Dawn heat pump, storing heat in our Australian-made thermal tank. No waste, no export at near-zero rates.
Heat your home on stored energy at night
When the sun sets and your family comes home, stored thermal energy circulates through your existing radiators and underfloor heating, keeping every room at the right temperature with the heat pump off through the expensive hours.
It schedules around your tariff
The controls plan charging around your electricity prices, your solar forecast and the weather, so you're comfortable and running on the cheapest energy available that day.
Keep Everything You Love.Replace Everything That Costs You.
What Stays
- Your radiators
- Your underfloor heating pipes
- Your zoned controls
- Your comfort
What Goes
- Your gas boiler
- Your gas connection
- Your gas bills
- Peak-rate electricity costs
For most homes, the retrofit is straightforward, Thermal Dawn connects to your existing hydronic pipework in place of your gas boiler. No new radiators, no major plumbing, no mess. A free site assessment confirms compatibility and gives you a fixed quote with no surprises.
Worried your radiators won't work with a heat pump? That's the most common concern we hear, and the answer is usually yes, they will.
Most Hydronic Homes Are a
Straightforward Retrofit
If you have an existing gas hydronic system with radiators, underfloor heating, or fan coils, you're already most of the way there. The main questions our site assessment answers:
Is your existing pipework in good condition?
What's your heating load, and what is the right capacity?
Where does the thermal storage tank go, inside or outside?
Does your switchboard need an upgrade?
We flag everything upfront. No surprises on install day.
What about summer? The same system runs in reverse to cool your home, through underfloor circuits or fan coil units. (Radiators can't cool; we map this out at assessment.)
Proof, not promises
In Hawthorn, Melbourne: gas boiler gone, gas meter off the house, heating running on stored solar. Running totals from the customer's own app: $1,439 saved, 29,040 MJ of gas avoided.
"We've been looking for 5 years for a hydronic heat pump, but we didn't want to pay $25,000. We finally did it."
Mike & Kay, Hawthorn
How it runs. It charges when power is cheapest, whether that's a free window, your own solar, or late-night off-peak. Then it holds the heat and runs your house through the evening with the compressor off. Radiators or a concrete slab, it's the same hardware and the same software. You set your tariff and the temperature you want. It handles the rest.
More than nine evenings in ten this winter, the heat pump hasn't run at all between 5pm and 9pm. The raw count: 59 of the last 63.
Ready to Get Off Gas?
Request a quote, it's free and carries no obligation. We'll confirm your home is a good fit, answer every question, and give you a fixed installed price.
Fully refundable reservation. No obligation until installation. Australian-made store, Australian-installed.
Frequently asked questions
How is thermal storage different from a battery?
Lithium batteries store electricity, then convert it back to heat when you need it, losing efficiency at every step. Thermal Dawn stores heat and cold directly, so your dawn solar becomes evening comfort without the conversion losses. It's infrastructure built to last decades. (See "Why not just a battery?" above for the full comparison.)
How much does it cost?
To get what Thermal Dawn does with off-the-shelf parts you're buying two things: a hydronic heat pump replacement, and a battery big enough to shift that heating to cheap hours. We do both jobs in one install. Total installed cost depends on your home size, existing pipework, and electrical setup. Book a free, no-obligation site assessment for a fixed quote.
How much will I save?
It depends on your gas bill, your tariff and how much of the system you take, so we model it for your home at the assessment rather than quote a headline number. What we can show you is measured: in Hawthorn the gas meter is off the house, and across both running systems the heat pump hasn't come on between 5pm and 9pm on more than nine evenings in ten this winter.
Do I need solar panels already?
No. See "Works with your solar, works without it too" above: cheap off-peak and free midday windows charge the store just as well. Adding solar later? The system picks it up automatically.
I already have a battery. Does this still help?
Yes, and the two aren't competing. A battery is expensive storage doing a general-purpose job; thermal storage is cheap storage doing one job very well. Heating, cooling and hot water are the largest, most predictable loads in the house, and covering them thermally is far cheaper per kWh than covering them from lithium.
The practical effect is that your battery stops being the thing that carries your heating. It's freed up for lights, appliances, the EV and overnight backup, and it lasts longer for not being cycled hard every winter evening. Homes with a battery already are often the clearest case, because the expensive storage stops being spent on the cheapest possible job.
What's included in the system?
Thermal Dawn Core (thermal store), high-efficiency heat pump (heating, cooling, hot water integration), optional domestic hot water module, smart controls and app, remote monitoring and software updates (opt-in). Comprehensive coverage across all components, details confirmed with your quote.
Be There at Dawn
Join the Australian homes building the thermal infrastructure the grid needs, one home at a time. Systems are installed and running; the next spots are open now.