Live data from Hacker News

Heat pump sales rise across Europe

pv-magazine.com

171–180 of 227 posts

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#171
post #155

Shame on The Netherlands: ~89% of homes still use natural gas in some way for heating [1], and their government are now "scrapping the obligation to purchase a heat pump in 2026" [2]. [1] https://www.cbs.nl/en-gb/news/2025/50/ever-more-gas-free-hom... [2] https://www.abnamro.nl/en/personal/specially-for/preferred-b...

Yeah big surprise that the populist government didn’t achieve anything and rolled back green initiatives. Good thing that they fell, sad that it took so long.

Stupid symbolic politics to own the greens. Good thing is that heatpumps are the most rational choice for new homes, so I don’t think much damage was done.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#172
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's usually so much more expensive than an air source heat pump that makes it completely not worth it.

Bingo. Literally abandonded in Lithuania, air to air is so much cheaper. Some builders even ditch hp altogheter - basic electric underfloor heating + solar panels is so much cheaper. I'm in New Zealand and my bedroom heater is $20 electric + $20 smart plug + $10 temperature sensor. Winter bill is ~$100 NZD. It would take ~20 years for heat pump to recover install cost alone.

I find that surprising - I'm only slightly north of Lithuania, and the seasonality of solar panels makes them pretty ineffective in the winter, and especially in the pre-dawn when you want to bring the house back up to temperature.

(when I had the instrumentation hooked up for a year: https://flatline.org.uk/daystats.html )

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#173
post #32

in the south, a lot of people opt for split Airconditioning instead of heatpumps. Cheaper and much easier to install/maintain

it makes sense combined with solar, I think. Hot weather usually means a lot of solar energy you can ideally use to cool your home. I still wonder why there isn't as much PV activity in Greece. I see solar water heaters on nearly every roof, but not solar energy.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#174
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The challenge is for people who live in apartment buildings in urban environment where you have no front yard you can drill into at your leisure.

The solution is of course to get a communal system. As a bonus, drilling one giant loop is significantly cheaper than drilling hundreds of smaller ones.

What isn't cheap, though, is maintaining the plumbing of the communal system, especially outside cities.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#175
post #8

A heat pump could win as the best HVAC technology, though a better drilling for ground-sourced ones. Just a shallow drilling (up to 100m) that works in retrofit mode, such as drilling from the basement, would be a great upgrade: - No outdoor unit that looks awful in many settings - works well, even in the coldest winter, without a spike in electricity usage, COP 5 - very reliable with long durability - super quiet, n…

Borehole or the pipe grid they stick under your backyard/garden (if you have a decent sized one) end up way more expensive.

But tbf, AI and robotics are rolling along pretty well. I'm surprised there's not a company that's just build the "this robot installs your borehole/underground pipes in 3 hours by itself" robot.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#176
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's usually so much more expensive than an air source heat pump that makes it completely not worth it.

Bingo. Literally abandonded in Lithuania, air to air is so much cheaper. Some builders even ditch hp altogheter - basic electric underfloor heating + solar panels is so much cheaper. I'm in New Zealand and my bedroom heater is $20 electric + $20 smart plug + $10 temperature sensor. Winter bill is ~$100 NZD. It would take ~20 years for heat pump to recover install cost alone.

As a Kiwi (now in UK) NZ doesn't get that cold for that long...mostly just wet, unless you're pretty far south.

In UK/other parts of Europe winter gets colder, lasts much longer, humid the entire time (so heat just escapes all over the place). Plus, the buildings here are a lot older - I think upgrading insulation would make a huge difference this side of the world.

I couldn't even imagine Canada. Almost moved there...decided to stay here. No -20c winters for me ty very much.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#177
post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latest nuclear reactor built in Europe was in France and took 17 years and its costs were 23 billion euro (roughly 27 billion $) with this amount of money you can basically install around 750000 heat pumps costing 30000€. So no it is probably not arse-backwards. (Germany alone would need 20-25 of them and it is unlikely that we can build more than 3-4 at the same time and even that is unlikely…)

Now pick the best (least costly / swiftest build) new power reactor build in the last ten years anywhere in the world. And anyway, your numbers are disingenuous, because it ignores the fact that heat pumps need electricity to power them, and that nuclear power reactors can provide district heating and that, and that the mean time between failures for the average split system heat pump is 7 to 10 years and that heat p…

> Now pick the best (least costly / swiftest build) new power reactor build in the last ten years anywhere in the world.

Unless you can pay the workers the same rates, and it's politically acceptable to the electorate to use the same standards, this is as irrelevant as the fact (yes, I have done the maths on this) that it's *technically* possible for China to divert an affordable percentage of its aluminium output over a decade to build a genuine planet-spanning power grid with 1Ω electrical resistance so you can have your mid-winter midnight electricity supplied by the mid-summer midday on the opposite side of the planet.

> and that nuclear power reactors can provide district heating and that

I have a heat pump. It works both ways, which means that unlike district heating, it also cools down the building in summer.

> that heat pumps sometimes fail in ways that the ozone depleting refrigerant to escape.

Solved by banning such refrigerants: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kigali_Amendment

"Can" is also doing a lot of heavy lifting even if such things hadn't been banned.

> A mix of nuclear / hydroelectric / combined cycle gas turbine power plants provided ample electricity for end-users to make use of cheap to manufacture heating technology (resistive), low maintenance, low replacement costs.

Hydro is cheap, but nuclear isn't. Hydro also works as a buffer (and pumped hydro as storage), so if you're combining it with stuff anyway, may as well combine with PV. Even small-scale domestic rooftop PV (which is the most expensive PV) is cheaper than nuclear at this point, so cheap that it makes sense to use as a fencing material even if you never get around to using it for power generation.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#178
post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latest nuclear reactor built in Europe was in France and took 17 years and its costs were 23 billion euro (roughly 27 billion $) with this amount of money you can basically install around 750000 heat pumps costing 30000€. So no it is probably not arse-backwards. (Germany alone would need 20-25 of them and it is unlikely that we can build more than 3-4 at the same time and even that is unlikely…)

Now pick the best (least costly / swiftest build) new power reactor build in the last ten years anywhere in the world. And anyway, your numbers are disingenuous, because it ignores the fact that heat pumps need electricity to power them, and that nuclear power reactors can provide district heating and that, and that the mean time between failures for the average split system heat pump is 7 to 10 years and that heat p…

| It’s evident the average commenter on this subject hasn’t run the numbers on a full cost benefit of the various options.

Strong words.

| heat pumps sometimes fail in ways that the ozone depleting refrigerant to escape.

R-290(propane) and R-744 (carbon dioxide) both have a Ozone depletion potential(ODP) of 0. What are you talking about?

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#179

I run daily comparisons between a gas boiler and a heat pump in the UK. Given that gas is cheaper than electricity, a well-installed and well-controlled gas boiler can still be cheaper to run. Heat pump running costs can drop drastically when combined with solar and battery storage, but that requires a much greater upfront investment. https://x.com/AO7186252340513 https://bsky.app/profile/showpiece.bsky.social

I have always wondered if a heat pump is even worth it if you don't have solar, all well and good the government giving massive discounts on heatpumps but not for a combined heatpump/solar install which would probably actually push most people towards it

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#180
post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bingo. Literally abandonded in Lithuania, air to air is so much cheaper. Some builders even ditch hp altogheter - basic electric underfloor heating + solar panels is so much cheaper. I'm in New Zealand and my bedroom heater is $20 electric + $20 smart plug + $10 temperature sensor. Winter bill is ~$100 NZD. It would take ~20 years for heat pump to recover install cost alone.

I find that surprising - I'm only slightly north of Lithuania, and the seasonality of solar panels makes them pretty ineffective in the winter, and especially in the pre-dawn when you want to bring the house back up to temperature. (when I had the instrumentation hooked up for a year: https://flatline.org.uk/daystats.html )

You can sell power to grid and get it back at a reasonable spread. Although I'm sure that's not going to be so lucrative in future.
Post reply on HN