Air conditioning installation in West London

One recent west London enquiry was for a single small bedroom in Hammersmith, cooling only, with a strong worry about noise. It is a good brief to plan around, because in the dense streets between Shepherd's Bush and the river the hard part of air conditioning installation in West London is rarely the indoor unit. It is finding a spot for the outdoor unit that is quiet for you, quiet for the people next door, and allowed by the lease or the planning rules.

"Cooling only" is worth one warning first. On a house, permitted development for an outdoor unit requires that it is not used solely for cooling, so ask for a reversible split, which nearly every installer quotes anyway [1]. The London guide covers this and the other capital-wide planning rules, and heating and cooling explains why the heating side often earns its keep.

Quiet in a street of back additions

West London's Victorian and Edwardian terraces, from Brackenbury Village to Fulham's grid of streets off the Fulham Palace Road, mostly have a two-storey back addition and a narrow gap between it and next door's. That gap is where the condenser usually ends up, and it is the worst place acoustically: two brick walls a couple of metres apart, with bedroom windows on both sides, bounce sound back and forth.

Indoors, look for a unit quoted in the low 20s dB(A) on its lowest fan speed, with a night mode that dims the display and slows the fan. For a small bedroom that means the smallest size most manufacturers make, around 2.0 kW. Resist upsizing "to be safe": an oversized unit reaches temperature, stops, and starts again, which is noisier and worse at removing humidity than a correctly sized one ticking over. Outdoors, a modern condenser typically sits around 45–55 dB(A) measured at one metre, lower at night.

The 42 dB(A) figure you will see quoted comes from MCS 020(a), the sound assessment that permitted development relies on [2]. It applies to an installation on a house going in under permitted development, measured at the neighbour's assessment position, and the standard sets out how reflective surfaces count, which is exactly the question in a back-addition gap. It does not apply to a flat: there, noise is something the council weighs on a planning application and the freeholder can attach as a condition to consent. Either way, put the condenser away from bedroom windows where you can, on anti-vibration mounts, and ask the installer to show you the assessment position they used. Our quiet units guide and bedroom guide go further on placement.

Mansion blocks and lightwells

The red-brick mansion blocks around Queen's Club Gardens, Barons Court and the western edges of Kensington are well-built, thick-walled and often hot in the upper floors. Their leases reserve the external walls to the freeholder, and their managing agents have seen plenty of condenser requests before. Expect a written policy: which elevations are acceptable (rarely the street front), whether units can go in the rear lightwell, and conditions on working hours, noise and making good.

A rear lightwell is the common answer and a mixed one. It hides the unit, but it is an enclosed, reflective space with other flats' windows looking into it, and anything installed there needs safe access for servicing. Planning permission is a separate step from the freeholder's consent; the flats guide sets out the order.

Conservation areas

Much of Hammersmith & Fulham is conservation area, including riverside streets like The Mall and St Peter's Square [3], and Ealing has been reviewing its conservation area boundaries, so check the current map rather than one you looked at years ago [4]. Most terraces put the condenser at the back anyway; the rule bites on corner plots and street-facing side walls, as the London guide explains.

Riverside apartments

The newer developments along the Thames, Fulham Reach and Imperial Wharf among them, vary more than any other property type in west London. Some were built with comfort cooling and need nothing but a service. Others combine floor-to-ceiling glass with windows that barely open, and a facade the building's owners will not let anyone drill. Check what your building already has, and read the lease, before getting quotes. Where external units are ruled out entirely, systems without an outdoor unit are the usual fallback, at the cost of some efficiency and more noise indoors, which matters if quiet was the point.

Cost

In west London the things that push a bedroom job up are a condenser position chosen for noise rather than convenience, which can mean a longer pipe run; a condensate pump where the drain cannot fall by gravity; and access equipment for an upper-floor flat. The cost guide has the indicative figures, and the cost estimator gives a range for your room.

Next step

Request an installer match. We'll review your requirements and match you with a suitable installer operating in your area. Tell us whether it is a house or a flat, which side of the building the room is on, and whether noise is the main concern, so the survey starts with the outdoor unit rather than the brochure. For the other side of the river, see South London.