Dux Hot Water has opened an environmental hot water training centre.
The Dux Solar Institute aims to train over 1,000 people in the next year to build the capability of the environmental hot water industry and increase the number of trained solar workers for the rapidly growing sector.
The Institute is located adjacent to Dux's manufacturing plant in Moss Vale, NSW, and will provide training and education to help overcome the issues plumbers and retailers face with environmental water heaters and the processes associated with solar technology.
"The increased demand for environmental water heaters has led to a surge in the requirement for skilled tradesmen and sales people," General manager for Dux Hot Water, Les Patterson, says.
"The hot water landscape will change dramatically and environmental water heaters typically require triple the labour time to install, relative to conventional electric water heaters. We see that there will be an enormous upheaval in the industry and plan to overcome this through dedicated solar hot water training sessions."
In November 2007, the largest survey ever undertaken of Australian plumbers showed that over 50 per cent of all plumbers surveyed lacked confidence in installing solar hot water systems. Two per cent of plumbers surveyed were very confident about installing solar hot water systems. Two years later in November 2009, a survey of plumbers showed that 68 per cent of plumbers wanted more training, 52 per cent had purchased and installed a solar in the last 12 months (up from 41 per cent in 2008), and 89 per cent of them would be interested in attending the Dux Solar Institute.
The Dux Solar Institute features 11 different working environmental hot water systems covering high efficiency gas, electric boosted solar, gas boosted solar and heat pump water heaters. The courses will cover technical information, water heater selection guides, installation procedures and fault-finding, in order to reduce installation problems and increase plumbers' confidence.
