DMKrow
Debbie Goldsmith 🏳️⚧️♾️🇺🇦RE: https://mastodon.social/@CelloMomOnCars/116250404645592330
This! There is as much disinformation about heat pumps as there is about EVs!
AaronI live in Minnesota and have a heat pump for our A/C and some of our heating. Newer ones can function in temperatures as low as -15°F. They do not function well enough to be the sole heating source in temperatures anywhere near that low. That's all people need to understand. In all those statistics about people on Norway or Sweden having them, that is not the only heat source. Depending on if one cares about cost effectiveness or emissions, and on energy prices and sources, they are generally recommended for providing heat down to about freezing. If it gets much colder than that with any frequency people need another heat source.
John Schrag@FWAaron I think your information might be out of date. I live in an area where it regularly goes below -20C in February, and my air-source cold climate heat pump has no trouble at all keeping my house toasty warm. I do have an alternative heat source, but I’ve never had to turn it on. The technology has really been improving over the last decade.
They are getting better and better. I have not heard of anyone using solely a heat pump for temperatures quite that cold but I suppose if you get one powerful enough compared to the size of your home than mine it will work. I do know where I live absolutely no contractor would install one as a sole heat source because in an average winter it does get around or past the absolute threshold of when a heat pump will work a few days. So my system was not planned as the sole heat source, so when it does get as cold as you mention, it will run but can't keep the house particularly warm. Also at those temps the cost or emissions efficiency comes into play if one cares about that.
AlsoPaisleyCat 🇨🇦They are good up to -25 C which is good enough for most of us.
C.S.Strowbridge@AlsoPaisleyCat @FWAaron @dgoldsmith
I was about to talk about the same study.
bananamangodog@dgoldsmith yep. Minus 40⁰C outside and the heat pump didn't miss a beat in keeping the house warm in Norway.
Malka Beth@dgoldsmith Ground source heat pumps no doubt work well long-term but the problem is their up front cost, many of us not having the money for said minimall up front cost of $15,000 nor the credit rating needed to get "financing", about a decade ago I asked what they might cost & was told it'd be over $50,000 which is just ridiculously expensive. Adding more insulation & getting regular heating & cooling devices being far more budgetable.
Ted Mielczarek@BrahmaBelarusian @dgoldsmith I had one installed when I built my house 14 years ago. It was $27k total, which was about $15k more than the baseline of getting a gas furnace. I got a 30% federal tax credit on the total cost + the cost got lumped into my construction loan and eventually my mortgage so it was a no-brainer.
@tedmielczarek @dgoldsmith I don't make enough to pay income taxes, we can't get home improvement loans, we don't have (& never got) a mortgage, the electricity for an air source heat pump would be more than what we currently & plan to use (after we improve our heating & cooling systems) and yes the up front cost is also more than the up front cost of the furnace & other parts of the system.
So for us it's the opposite answer in what "no-brainer" would be, as paying more up front to pay more later doesn't make any sense!
We've got a 115 year old house in need of more than a few repairs, which also makes a big difference.
*A ground source heat pump at least theoretically would save us money if we can find a way to cover it's initial installation costs (which would be about 3 times an air source heat pump) but even then, it'd take at least a decade and rely on many other things going perfectly to work, making 20 years more likely as that decade doesn't include maintenance costs, if it ever would give us savings. My husband being over 65 years old now, this would really take a great sales pitch & hard numbers to convince him & in turn me (I'm the easier to convince on this) that it would be worthwhile...
...but the only possible way the air source heat pump might make sense even to me, is if we got enough solar & wind generation up & running, with a full battery backup set for 30 days, to completely cover our electric usage to include said air source heat pump & even then the solar panels & wind turbine setup would need to be low enough (without tax credits/rebates, as we won't get them) to truly net it out to paying for itself & I don't see that likely within my lifetime.
Nate Allen@BrahmaBelarusian these are air source heat pumps, just ones with very efficient variable compressors, and they are great. I have the two zone system version of the Mitsubishi Mr Slim unit pictured, we've had it for years, and have not had to do a thing to it in terms of serious maintenance or any repair.
If you ever travel to Asia you will see these everywhere. One had been bolted outside of our porthole on a little handmade boat we traveled on in Indonesia.
@mossyfoot okay so for this less efficient than ground source & higher replacement cost system, it'd be $10,000-$15,000 instead of $30,000-60,000 for my home, which still won't ever makeup it's cost & is way too expensive, but at least would put it at under what we paid for the house & property itself.
*Forget traveling to Asia, at this point I doubt I'll ever get a passport again.