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Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

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Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#51

Post by melling »

afavour wrote: post #24
digdugdirk wrote: post #2

Well this was an oddly terrifying introductory paragraph for an IEEE article: "... half of Phoenix residents are at risk of an emergency room visit or worse if their electricity fails during a future heat wave, according to a recent study. Air conditioning is what keeps people there comfortable—and alive—a growing fraction of the year. The extreme heat already kills hundreds of Phoenix-area residents every year, a nu…

I've only ever visited Phoenix but when I did it was mid July and being outside genuinely did not feel hospitable to human life. That statement doesn't surprise me at all. Unless you're employed in, I dunno, the solar power industry I really feel like you shouldn't be living there. It should be like living on an oil rig.

Can’t deal with a little extremes on earth?

Sort of makes one wonder how we’re ever going to colonize Mars so we’re not a single planet species.

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#52

Post by genmud »

ashconnor wrote: post #35
digdugdirk wrote: post #2

Well this was an oddly terrifying introductory paragraph for an IEEE article: "... half of Phoenix residents are at risk of an emergency room visit or worse if their electricity fails during a future heat wave, according to a recent study. Air conditioning is what keeps people there comfortable—and alive—a growing fraction of the year. The extreme heat already kills hundreds of Phoenix-area residents every year, a nu…

I would imagine solar panels would be a good investment in a climate like this.

There is actually efficiency issues with the high heat... but they do help offset the AC requirements, so overall even if the efficiency is down 20-40% because of heat, you require potentially 20-50% less A/C because it shades the roof.

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#53

Post by brianpan »

nottorp wrote: post #3

Isnt any a/c a heat pump though?

And isn't the refrigerant the same with a heat pump?

The article says that heat pumps are "compatible with natural refrigerants with lower climate impacts". Why couldn't A/C units use the same natural refrigerants?

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#54

Post by brabel »

afavour wrote: post #24
digdugdirk wrote: post #2

Well this was an oddly terrifying introductory paragraph for an IEEE article: "... half of Phoenix residents are at risk of an emergency room visit or worse if their electricity fails during a future heat wave, according to a recent study. Air conditioning is what keeps people there comfortable—and alive—a growing fraction of the year. The extreme heat already kills hundreds of Phoenix-area residents every year, a nu…

I've only ever visited Phoenix but when I did it was mid July and being outside genuinely did not feel hospitable to human life. That statement doesn't surprise me at all. Unless you're employed in, I dunno, the solar power industry I really feel like you shouldn't be living there. It should be like living on an oil rig.

Do you think people shouldn't be living in Chicago (or most of Canada and the US midwest for that matter) because without heating it's just completely inhospitable to human life during the winter?

Or pretty much all Australian cities in summer?

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#55

Post by wcfields »

LUmBULtERA wrote: post #13
cornstalks wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but typically “heat pump” is used to mean it can provide heating too, whereas standard “A/C” is a “one-way” heat pump that only provides cooling.

I always went with this description too, though oddly a "heat pump water heater" only works one direction, yet "heat pump" is still in its name.

Have to imagine that the niche market for making 40F/4C "cold" water from luke-warm tap water (if you live in an area that is so hot the tap water is warm) is fairly small.

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#56

Post by davidmurdoch »

Being a Florida native, seeing an article titled "Heat Pumps [are] the Future of A/Cs" feels like it should have a ` [1973]` tacked on to the end of it. A heat pump is pretty much the only thing we use here, we just use them in reverse. Literally. Most residential units have a "reversing valve" that must be held open by a constant 24V in order to cool the air - the default mode is heating -- which is so smart to have a failure mode that causes your house to be heated in the summer to 95F while you sleep.

Anyway, my heat pump just stopped working this weekend, and its getting very hot in here.

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#57

Post by mathgeek »

afavour wrote: post #24
digdugdirk wrote: post #2

Well this was an oddly terrifying introductory paragraph for an IEEE article: "... half of Phoenix residents are at risk of an emergency room visit or worse if their electricity fails during a future heat wave, according to a recent study. Air conditioning is what keeps people there comfortable—and alive—a growing fraction of the year. The extreme heat already kills hundreds of Phoenix-area residents every year, a nu…

I've only ever visited Phoenix but when I did it was mid July and being outside genuinely did not feel hospitable to human life. That statement doesn't surprise me at all. Unless you're employed in, I dunno, the solar power industry I really feel like you shouldn't be living there. It should be like living on an oil rig.

As a thought experiment, the same logic can be applied to any region where lack of shelter or heating would make human life unsustainable.

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#58

Post by kalleboo »

retrac wrote: post #46
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've read a few times that the population of the entire US south only really started to grow in earnest once AC was invented. Ah, here's an article: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/04/upshot/the-all-conquering... It's pretty crazy because growing up in central/northern Alberta, I never even really encountered air conditioning until I was into my early 20s and moved to southern Ontario (where living without it would b…

I've likewise read arguments that AC is linked to the substantial economic growth in the second half of the 20th century, in regions like southern France, southern Japan, and the southern United States. All regions that historically lagged economically behind their culturally and economically similar more northern counterpart regions. Hard to say how much of a factor, but there has to be some truth to it: just imagin…

The man credited with making Singapore the powerhouse it is today has also been adamant that without Air Conditioning, tropical countries couldn’t develop https://www.vox.com/2015/3/23/8278085/singapore-lee-kuan-yew...

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#59

Post by phpisthebest »

silisili wrote: post #10
digdugdirk wrote: post #2

Well this was an oddly terrifying introductory paragraph for an IEEE article: "... half of Phoenix residents are at risk of an emergency room visit or worse if their electricity fails during a future heat wave, according to a recent study. Air conditioning is what keeps people there comfortable—and alive—a growing fraction of the year. The extreme heat already kills hundreds of Phoenix-area residents every year, a nu…

Sure, but it can happen anywhere. I was just reading yesterday about a person who died in Portland of heat during the dome. Same with cold weather, if the gas/electric goes out during the winter. There's really only a few places one can live with moderate enough weather to avoid those scenarios.

>>Same with cold weather,

I 100% disagree with this...

Heat is made by everything, waste heat is a byproduct of all modern things, and there are TONS of easy low cost ways to make heat even it is just as simple as burning something.

Also the body makes head naturally so adding layers to trap this heat does not require continual inputs from an outside resource

Cooling on the other hand is MUCH harder, and electricity is really the only avenue to make cooling. Even if you say use ICE, well that Ice was made at some point by a freezer running on Electricity

IMO hot climate is MUCH MUCH more dangerous than cold, which is why I choose to live in an area where there are only 1 or 2 months of even remotely hot climate.

As I told my last HVAC... Heat I can make 100 ways... Cooling I need central air for...

Re: Heat Pumps – The Well-Tempered Future of A/Cs

#60

Post by bklyn11201 »

nightski wrote: post #26
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #15

I live in a colder climate where heat pumps are not popular. After talking with a number of HVAC people about this I was surprised to learn that despite being very similar to an AC system in principle, in practice converting an AC system into a heat pump system doesn't make economic sense--you end up just ripping one out and installing the other. I don't fully understand why this is the case, but I hope that there's…

The thing is (especially where I live) I'd still need a gas furnace. We regularly see -20F to -40F in the winter. While the 95% scenario sounds great, in practice still needing gas means we still need all the gas infrastructure. From my understanding natural gas burns pretty clean. The problem is leaks in infrastructure and drilling, which isn't going away because I buy a heat pump.

You need a backup heat source, but it doesn't necessarily mean you need full infrastructure of gas lines, ducting, and gas furnace. You could have an electric backup connected to ducted heat pump (e.g., non-efficient, pure electric) or could use electric strip heating, electric portable heaters, wood stoves, etc.
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