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Heat pump sales rise across Europe

pv-magazine.com

181–190 of 227 posts

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#181
post #26

> [it] become[s] cheaper than gas heating within 11 to 14 years This a no-brainer for buildings with high energy use. But we looked into getting a heat pump last year but it doesn't pan out because our house (15 years old) has a very low energy use and we would not recover the costs (about 20K euros after subsidies) for 20+ years.

> [it] become[s] cheaper than gas heating within 11 to 14 years They also always stop the savings estimates right before the expected lifespan of the heatpump, at which point you have to buy a new unit which destroys the actual savings

At the moment, heat pumps are mostly retrofitted to homes not designed for heat pumps, which adds to the cost. You can't compare that work to a future heat pump swap which is a much smaller job.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#182
post #87
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

It doesn't work this way. Dense cities just don't have enough space for geothermal heating. It really works for single-family homes only, or maybe just a slightly more dense areas. Not to mention that city infrastructure is WAY too expensive to build, anywhere. You'll spend more money on planning than on doing the actual construction.

> geothermal heating

Ground source heat pumps != geothermal heating.

The technologies are completely different.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#183
post #61
post #26

> [it] become[s] cheaper than gas heating within 11 to 14 years This a no-brainer for buildings with high energy use. But we looked into getting a heat pump last year but it doesn't pan out because our house (15 years old) has a very low energy use and we would not recover the costs (about 20K euros after subsidies) for 20+ years.

Your existing system will not last forever. When you have to spend money anyway that changes things.

in my case: 3k at most for a replacement gas furnace, and heat pumps would require new wirings as well. Many things would need to break at once to make it worth considering when you have older homes

New homes with mandated PV and battery, that's another story.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#185
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your existing system will not last forever. When you have to spend money anyway that changes things.

in my case: 3k at most for a replacement gas furnace, and heat pumps would require new wirings as well. Many things would need to break at once to make it worth considering when you have older homes New homes with mandated PV and battery, that's another story.

Where I live every house has the wiring for AC anyway, so a heat pump only needs a different valve in the system you will always have (this is about $50 in parts, but they charge thousands extra for it)

I paid for it anyway - my furnace was 50 years old (probably 60% efficient when new), and I have no idea how bad the AC was. That said, for less money I added more insulation to my house and that has a better ROI. (unfortunately the design of the house doesn't allow for even more insulation even though I could save a lot more if it could be done)

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In an EV they literally are.

Yes? But without the few bits and bobs of extra control for handling that condition they are, effectively, not. Same for AC and heat pumps.

EVs have regenerative breaking and so come with those bits and bobs.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#187
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corrosion will destroy the tank's fittings/liner. Quickly. So quickly, in fact, that it is mentioned multiple times in the installation manual to not do lots of things (no salt-fed softeners in bold/red/all-the-things).

Possibly obvious point, water softeners add salt to the water.

and then you heat the salt, which is even better!

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#188

For anybody in TVA's electricity networks (mostly: Tennessee): they offer an annual promotion to single-family homeowners only to purchase an $1800 AO heatpump waterheater for only $250 . Maths: 85% discount on fancy new waterheater, which also dehumidifies and cools your house (passive result of heatpump). TVA usually offers this promotion between Thanksgiving and NYE. You can order online from HomeDepot, or walk in…

In MD, they had rebates for gas-fired instant hot water heaters and tanked heat pump water heaters, but not electric instant water heaters.

Makes no sense...

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes? But without the few bits and bobs of extra control for handling that condition they are, effectively, not. Same for AC and heat pumps.

EVs have regenerative breaking and so come with those bits and bobs.

But not all electric motors are paired such. Which is the point: a heat pump and an AC are "the same thing" at the gross level, but that doesn't mean all ACs have all the bits and bobs necessary for them to act as heat pumps.

Re: Heat pump sales rise across Europe

#190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do the places you are referring to not require heat? If so I don't see why having a separate heating and cooling system would be cheaper to maintain than a single system. Come to think of it I don't see why a heatpump would be more expensive to maintain than split AC. I guess there is some extra circuitry to make sure it doesn't ice up in the winter and maybe backup resistance heating builtin.

Most split A/Cs can also heat. "Heat pump" can mean many things, from essentially "split A/C" (air-air heat pumps) to ground-source heat pumps, using floor heating for the output, warm water production from the heat pump, etc.

Split ACs which can heat but are not billed as heat pumps will very often use resistive heaters.
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