What is the real story around heat pumps?

[nctnico]

Well, you have to define those 'existential' threats. IMHO the threats are way overblown as the earth and humanity have seen far worse events (like massive vulcanic eruptions, meteorites and ice ages).

Now, as for the claim that humanity has seen far worse events: Would you mind giving an example of a volcanic eruption, a meteorite, and an ice age, respectively, that humanity has experienced and that you think was far worse than climate change will become for humanity if we don't limit the temperature rise as recommended by the concensus of scientists?

To give you a heads up: Modern humans evolved at most 400,000 years ago. The last ice age was ~ 2.4 million years ago. If I were you, I wouldn't waste too much time trying to find an ice age that humanity has experienced.

You are ill-informed then. Northern Europe was covered in a thick layer of ice 20000 years ago. And even more around 115000 years ago. From the latter period it is very easy to see where the ice ended in the landscape near where I live.

With today's level of technology there is a lot more the human race can do to remedy effects than ever before. I've been around long enough to notice the climate is changing myself (while carefully keeping in mind that memories typically compress the time frame). I've also been around long enough to know humanity can put serious and effective measures into place to remedy and reverse damage done to the environment. IOW: don't worry too much, it will be OK.

What I am wondering is: How would you recognize ahead of time a case where the technology that the human race has available would actually be insufficient to remedy/reverse the damage?

Are you saying that it is somehow logically impossible for humanity to cause damage to the environment that it can not remedy or reverse? If so, why would that be? And it not, then how did you determine that this instance of damage to the environment is in the category of cases that can be remedied/reversed?

Or are you saying that because we have in the past caused damage to the environment that we were able to remedy, that therefore any damage that we cause to the environment can be remedied?

If so, would you see any flaw with it if someone told you that they had been in various car crashes that they had all survived, and that they concluded that it therefore was impossible for them to die in a car crash?

You are seeing that completely wrong. Consider humanity like a bunch of ants in a nest. Some will die and if living conditions get worse, the ants will move somewhere else. Translated to your car analogy: cars are continously improved to become safer in the big picture.
Also be aware that nature and the face of the earth change continuously. There is no fixed or final state. One of the major shortcomings of many environmentalists is that they want to keep things the same. If they could, they would want to make the moon stop circling around the earth so to say.

[tom66]

Why are we even bothering to compare whether humans lived 20,000 years ago in an ice age or not?  It's irrelevant.  Utterly irrelevant.  Life expectancy was shorter in those times too, turns out temperate climates are about right for humans.  It isn't conducive to survival to be in extreme weather of any kind.  But it's not representative of the threat of climate change.

The problem with climate change is not human extinction, no one serious thinks humans will go extinct, it is the severe and irreversible harm it will do to an ecosystem that is currently well balanced, that is currently able to feed approximately 7 billion people adequately (and another ~1 billion inadequately).  It is the threat to arable land especially in equatorial areas.  It is the flood threat to countries with limited sea defences.  It is the extreme temperature and drought threat to most countries 15 degrees either side of the equator.

Upset the delicate balance and trigger these events and you will have war, famine and illness - that is the big danger of climate change - not slightly hotter summers or colder winters.

[coppice]

Well, you have to define those 'existential' threats. IMHO the threats are way overblown as the earth and humanity have seen far worse events (like massive vulcanic eruptions, meteorites and ice ages).

Now, as for the claim that humanity has seen far worse events: Would you mind giving an example of a volcanic eruption, a meteorite, and an ice age, respectively, that humanity has experienced and that you think was far worse than climate change will become for humanity if we don't limit the temperature rise as recommended by the concensus of scientists?

To give you a heads up: Modern humans evolved at most 400,000 years ago. The last ice age was ~ 2.4 million years ago. If I were you, I wouldn't waste too much time trying to find an ice age that humanity has experienced.

You are ill-informed then. Northern Europe was covered in a thick layer of ice 20000 years ago. And even more around 115000 years ago. From the latter period it is very easy to see where the ice ended in the landscape near where I live.

There is plenty of evidence that people followed the retreating ice sheets into northern Europe, as the last ice age cycle subsided. Ice ages cycle about every 100k years, and have been doing so for numerous cycles.

[nctnico]

Why are we even bothering to compare whether humans lived 20,000 years ago in an ice age or not?  It's irrelevant.  Utterly irrelevant.  Life expectancy was shorter in those times too, turns out temperate climates are about right for humans.  It isn't conducive to survival to be in extreme weather of any kind.  But it's not representative of the threat of climate change.

The problem with climate change is not human extinction, no one serious thinks humans will go extinct, it is the severe and irreversible harm it will do to an ecosystem that is currently well balanced, that is currently able to feed approximately 7 billion people adequately (and another ~1 billion inadequately).  It is the threat to arable land especially in equatorial areas.  It is the flood threat to countries with limited sea defences.  It is the extreme temperature and drought threat to most countries 15 degrees either side of the equator.

Upset the delicate balance and trigger these events and you will have war, famine and illness - that is the big danger of climate change - not slightly hotter summers or colder winters.

There is no such thing as a delicate balance. There is only chaos in the weather system. You can't even be 100% sure that the temperature change we're seeing is due to human activity. There are so many factors that you can't even begin to create a suitable model. For starters take the huge amount of energy the sun is supplying to the earth. Even a small fluctuation can have a massive effect and this happens as the sun's energy output isn't constant at all. Data shows that sun has been outputting more energy since 1700. But you can't even start to claim that causes an increase in temperature. It might as well cause a decrease in the long term. Nowadays the news is way to quick to attribute every bit of rain (or lack thereof) to climate change. Accurate data goes back only 100 years or so.

[zilp]

Well, you have to define those 'existential' threats. IMHO the threats are way overblown as the earth and humanity have seen far worse events (like massive vulcanic eruptions, meteorites and ice ages).

Now, as for the claim that humanity has seen far worse events: Would you mind giving an example of a volcanic eruption, a meteorite, and an ice age, respectively, that humanity has experienced and that you think was far worse than climate change will become for humanity if we don't limit the temperature rise as recommended by the concensus of scientists?

To give you a heads up: Modern humans evolved at most 400,000 years ago. The last ice age was ~ 2.4 million years ago. If I were you, I wouldn't waste too much time trying to find an ice age that humanity has experienced.

You are ill-informed then. Northern Europe was covered in a thick layer of ice 20000 years ago. And even more around 115000 years ago. From the latter period it is very easy to see where the ice ended in the landscape near where I live.

Well, that depends on what exactly you mean by "ice age".

But it doesn't really matter anyhow, as even a mere 20000 years ago there was nothing close to the current human population, so the fact that (some) humans survived that time doesn't tell you anything useful for today anyhow.

Also ... what about the volcanic eruption and the meteorite?

With today's level of technology there is a lot more the human race can do to remedy effects than ever before. I've been around long enough to notice the climate is changing myself (while carefully keeping in mind that memories typically compress the time frame). I've also been around long enough to know humanity can put serious and effective measures into place to remedy and reverse damage done to the environment. IOW: don't worry too much, it will be OK.

What I am wondering is: How would you recognize ahead of time a case where the technology that the human race has available would actually be insufficient to remedy/reverse the damage?

Are you saying that it is somehow logically impossible for humanity to cause damage to the environment that it can not remedy or reverse? If so, why would that be? And it not, then how did you determine that this instance of damage to the environment is in the category of cases that can be remedied/reversed?

Or are you saying that because we have in the past caused damage to the environment that we were able to remedy, that therefore any damage that we cause to the environment can be remedied?

If so, would you see any flaw with it if someone told you that they had been in various car crashes that they had all survived, and that they concluded that it therefore was impossible for them to die in a car crash?

You are seeing that completely wrong. Consider humanity like a bunch of ants in a nest. Some will die and if living conditions get worse, the ants will move somewhere else.

OK. And how many humans do you expect to die? And where do you think the remaining humans will move?

Translated to your car analogy: cars are continously improved to become safer in the big picture.

Yeah. But you do understand that there is a limit to how bad of a crash a modern car with all the state of the art safety systems will save you from, right?

Also be aware that nature and the face of the earth change continuously. There is no fixed or final state.

OK. And how is that relevant here? What does that have to do with climate change, or with whether there is reason to worry, or ... anything in this dicussion?

One of the major shortcomings of many environmentalists is that they want to keep things the same. If they could, they would want to make the moon stop circling around the earth so to say.

Please provide a source for that claim.

[zilp]

There is no such thing as a delicate balance.

You are aware that you are in disagreement with about everyone who does research in that area professionally, right?

There is only chaos in the weather system.

You are aware that "the weather system" is to climate as "resistor noise" is to an amplifier, right? Do you also think that amplifiers don't produce any useful signal because the resistor noise in the bias resistors is only chaos?

You can't even be 100% sure that the temperature change we're seeing is due to human activity.

Are you saying that you can only be 99% sure, or are you saying that you can only be 1% sure?

If the former: How is this a relevant objection, then?

If the latter: You are aware that you are in disagreement with about everyone who does research in that area professionally, right?

There are so many factors that you can't even begin to create a suitable model. For starters take the huge amount of energy the sun is supplying to the earth. Even a small fluctuation can have a massive effect and this happens as the sun's energy output isn't constant at all. Data shows that sun has been outputting more energy since 1700. But you can't even start to claim that causes an increase in temperature. It might as well cause a decrease in the long term.

You are aware that you are in disagreement with about everyone who does research in that area professionally, who also happen to be aware of the sun's behaviour, right?

Nowadays the news is way to quick to attribute every bit of rain (or lack thereof) to climate change.

... so? Do you think that because some news journalist says some nonsense, that therefore, there is noone on the planet who actually has a clue on the respective topic? Like, how is this relevant here?

Accurate data goes back only 100 years or so.

You are aware that scientists who work on climate change have many natural data sources that go back way longer than human weather records, right?

In particular, you did notice that you seem to be convinced that there was significant glaciation about 20000 years ago, even though that is in fact longer than 100 years ago?

[johansen]

Is this what this forum has become?  5% useful posts on actual heatpump data, 95% argument?

[Monkeh]

Is this what this forum has become?  5% useful posts on actual heatpump data, 95% argument?

Welcome to the internet.

[Someone]

Is this what this forum has become?  5% useful posts on actual heatpump data, 95% argument?

Something about heatpumps brings out the crazies, not just this forum. So the OP asking for honest answers (being overwhelmed by the noise) is fully understandable.

[Siwastaja]

Japan and China have vast numbers of heat pumps for cooling but very few are capable of heating.

Total bullshit. You only have to visit these countries to see. Africa pretty much the same. The reason they are used for heating is not only environmental, or good COP. It's convenience. One single unit does both, so you don't need separate systems for heating and cooling. In climates where heating needs are modest, having a separate system when your "cooling" unit can do the same is just insane. Similarly, wrapping in blankets in cold moist winter days without heating is just insane when you can have heating from the same heatpump by paying $50 more for the unit. And electricity in these countries is cheaper than it is for you in the UK. Even if you are very poor and saving in heating or cooling cost by heating/cooling less, you would still have the system.

[pcprogrammer]

Is this what this forum has become?  5% useful posts on actual heatpump data, 95% argument?

Something about heatpumps brings out the crazies, not just this forum. So the OP asking for honest answers (being overwhelmed by the noise) is fully understandable.

Luckily I'm able to filter the noise and as I wrote earlier I got the answers I was looking for. Now I participate in the noise too. 

I read in a book of a Dutch guy that the IPCC does not see cities to be a contributor to the climate change. All I could find was that they see cities as high risk areas due to climate change. They just focus on CO2 as the big culprit in the whole climate change.

My opinion is that this is short sighted, and that there are many more factors in play.

Paving the planet with solar panels or harvesting all the lithium in the world, etc, might only make things worse. Humanity is it's own worst enemy. We poison our planet just to make a couple of bucks. I'm no exception. We try to do our best with reducing on consumption, but still want to have a bit of fun and luxury, so yes I buy things on Aliexpress and we live in a very big house.

A delicate balance was mentioned in some posts. One thing humanity is not capable of, keeping balance.

Edit: A Dutch article about the writer of the book I mentioned.

[Siwastaja]

Paving the planet with solar panels or harvesting all the lithium in the world, etc, might only make things worse.

Don't take it too extreme, but there is something to this. Efficient solutions should be preferred and e.g. a simple air-to-air heatpump which costs 500€ to buy and uses a few dozen kg of common materials like plastics, iron, aluminum, copper, yet harvests 1kW (input power) * 2 (SCOP-1) * 24*365 * 0.5 (duty cycle) * 12 (years lifetime) = 100 000 kWh of free, renewable energy. A 4-5kWp PV system would then harvest say 5000 kWh/year * 20 year lifetime = roughly the same 100 000 kWh of free, renewable energy.

But the environmental cost of manufacturing the heatpump is probably smaller, it is significantly cheaper to buy, and it harvests energy during winter nights, too. This doesn't mean PV is bad, just something to think about for the priority list.

Lithium ion battery storage is then again at least an order of magnitude worse again. Especially if you have any low-hanging fruit like controlling the usage of electric hot water production which can easily store 20kWh worth of energy by just adding 500€ worth of control to an existing system. Compare the ecological footprint and install cost to li-ion battery system of the same size!

Then again, maybe such low-hanging fruit is not available. I'm not saying never to install battery systems. Just something to think about for priorities.

[pcprogrammer]

Then again, maybe such low-hanging fruit is not available. I'm not saying never to install battery systems. Just something to think about for priorities.

Don't get me wrong, I neither am saying not to take action, but indeed think about the action you are taking and don't willy-nilly buy into what the media or politics is trying to shove down your throat.

The whole idea of these systems to pay for themselves is kind of bullshit. Sure it can reduce on your energy bill, but it will still cost money. Depending on the type of system and the cost to install it can take a long time before any savings start to come. You will have to take into account the loss of interest or dividends the sum you are spending on such a system might have given you too. Won't be much for a system of a couple of grand, but when it becomes 10 or more K's it adds up.

So for us we just see it as cost for living in comfort and not as a way to save money. Living costs money is a simple fact of life. That we might help in "saving the planet" is a small bonus. 

As is, it is more likely helping the economy. 

[Siwastaja]

The whole idea of these systems to pay for themselves is kind of bullshit. Sure it can reduce on your energy bill, but it will still cost money. Depending on the type of system and the cost to install it can take a long time before any savings start to come.

Remember that expensive systems such as quoted for you are a kind of specialty of wealthy societies and wealthy households. Energy solutions are being sold exceeding their true value, because there is market for that and people still buy. My air-to-water heat pump installation was less than 4000EUR all parts included, although I did the install work myself but it would have been less than 1000EUR for work if I just paid for hourly rates for electrician and plumber; and the end result is way better than how a typical 15000EUR complete one size fits all solution would have been.

Typical cost for air-to-water retrofit was around 8000-9000 EUR here but nearly doubled to 14-15000 EUR almost overnight after a 4000EUR subsidy come into place. The market does not reflect actual costs, and any subsidies further twist the market. Enough people are willing to pay outrageous prices when they feel good about it.

In Japan air-to-air heatpump costs something like 500EUR installed so one can easily afford one per each room. They do pay back for themselves, that's literally why they were developed in 1980's in the first place, to save cost of fossil fuels.

[nctnico]

The whole idea of these systems to pay for themselves is kind of bullshit. Sure it can reduce on your energy bill, but it will still cost money. Depending on the type of system and the cost to install it can take a long time before any savings start to come.

Remember that expensive systems such as quoted for you are a kind of specialty of wealthy societies and wealthy households. Energy solutions are being sold exceeding their true value, because there is market for that and people still buy. My air-to-water heat pump installation was less than 4000EUR all parts included, although I did the install work myself but it would have been less than 1000EUR for work if I just paid for hourly rates for electrician and plumber; and the end result is way better than how a typical 15000EUR complete one size fits all solution would have been.

Typical cost for air-to-water retrofit was around 8000-9000 EUR here but nearly doubled to 14-15000 EUR almost overnight after a 4000EUR subsidy come into place. The market does not reflect actual costs, and any subsidies further twist the market. Enough people are willing to pay outrageous prices when they feel good about it.

That is absolutely true. About a year ago I did a DIY solar panel install costing me around 3700 euro in parts. To have it installed I got quotes for nearly double that price. But that was during a period of extreme hype so installers could ask any price and people would pay for it. My solar panel system will still pay for itself in 3 years though.

Now I'm looking at putting a 'green roof' on the shed (just for kicks and because I like growing plants). Due to subsidies this is insanely expensive to buy off the shelve. Unfortunately I don't have time right now to execute a DIY solution I came up with.

[tom66]

The whole idea of these systems to pay for themselves is kind of bullshit. Sure it can reduce on your energy bill, but it will still cost money. Depending on the type of system and the cost to install it can take a long time before any savings start to come.

Remember that expensive systems such as quoted for you are a kind of specialty of wealthy societies and wealthy households. Energy solutions are being sold exceeding their true value, because there is market for that and people still buy. My air-to-water heat pump installation was less than 4000EUR all parts included, although I did the install work myself but it would have been less than 1000EUR for work if I just paid for hourly rates for electrician and plumber; and the end result is way better than how a typical 15000EUR complete one size fits all solution would have been.

Typical cost for air-to-water retrofit was around 8000-9000 EUR here but nearly doubled to 14-15000 EUR almost overnight after a 4000EUR subsidy come into place. The market does not reflect actual costs, and any subsidies further twist the market. Enough people are willing to pay outrageous prices when they feel good about it.

In Japan air-to-air heatpump costs something like 500EUR installed so one can easily afford one per each room. They do pay back for themselves, that's literally why they were developed in 1980's in the first place, to save cost of fossil fuels.

Indeed.  It is kind of bonkers how expensive heat pumps are to install professionally.  I can buy a monobloc unit for my house for about £4,000.  That replaces the boiler and provides heat.  I would need a hot water tank (for on-demand hot water) and some plumbing work to complete it, but to get this work done professionally would cost around £12,000.  There are only a limited number of professionals that can do this work, and they are in high demand.  We have really dropped the ball when it comes to skilled trades, instead of sending kids to trade schools we're sending them to get pointless degrees in subjects they don't need or want.  (Rant over.)

[Zero999]

It's nonsense because China, Russia and the USA are never going to adopt net zero.

Why not?

I'm just not going to discuss net zero, propaganda and taxes. They're political and will just result in pages of arguing, with neither of us agreeing. I just don't support it. You clearly do. We'll just have to disagree and leave it at that.

That is simply a lie. You did discuss just that, as I quoted above. You just don't want to defend your position when challenged. If you didn't want to discuss it, you wouldn't have mentioned it in the first place.

Now it appears you're tying to provoke me, which will not work. I'm more than capable of defending my position. Indeed I consider it to be fairly obvious.  I just do not want to discuss the matter here any more. For one it's against the rules of this forum and secondly I know from previous experience it's impossible to discuss such matters in a logical manner with those who resort to accusations of lying. It'll just result in pages of arguing, the thread being locked and possibly both of us being banned. It's just not worth the bother.  This is me exercising self-control. There is a part of me that really wants to write a long rebuttal to your post, but I know better.

On the other hand, I know if I replaced my gas boiler with an electric heat pump, it will lose money, so it would be a dumb investment for me. I'm not going to buy a system which will cost a lot of money and cost more to run. It would be like me trying to persuade you into investing in a new paper magazine publication. It will lose money.

It's just that you don't actually know that. Whether replacing a gas boiler with an electric heat pump now is a net profitable decision depends heavily on the development of energy supply costs and the purchase price and installation costs of heat pumps over the lifetime of that (hypothetical) heat pump. And as you don't know any of these to a particularly high degree of certainty, you also can't necessarily know whether installing a heat pump now would lose you money.

I have done the calculations,  as has someone else here, who is also an advocate of heat pumps.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/what-is-the-real-story-around-heat-pumps/msg5347484/#msg5347484

One thing that is pretty likely, though, for a variety of reasons, is that the price differential between gas and electricity will shrink, and possibly even invert, which at the very least means that betting on gas is not a particularly safe bet.

And guess what. If it becomes economical for me to buy an electric heat pump, then can do it. It's just uneconomical at the moment. I don't see why you appear to be having difficulty understanding that.

How did you get to that number?

Given:

The gas engine has an efficiency of 30%

The heat pump system a COP of 300%, i.e. for every 100W of mechanical power from the engine, I get 300W of heat.

Calculate the total COP of the heat pump, driven from the gas engine:

100W of power goes in:

The engine is 30% efficient, thus produces:
30W power to the shaft, which is delivered to the heat pump, which generates three times as much heat 30W*3 = 90W
70W of heat, which isn't wasted but goes into my home.

Total heat to my home 90 + 70 = 160W, hence a total COP of 160%

... which assumes that the exhaust will be at outdoor temperature (i.e., your heating water return is below outdoor temperature?) and at the same absolute humidity as outdoor air (which indeed would be likely with outdoor-temperature exhaust ... but not so much in reality)!?

Also, I don't know all that much about the power regulation of combustion engines, but I think that they at the very least have a relatively narrow band of rotational speed where they reach maximum efficiency, and I suspect that exhaust temperature is part of that equation and thus can not be varied continuously to match the water heat exchanger without sacrificing mechanical efficiency!?

Which is to say: It seems highly optimistic to me to assume that you could capture 100% of the waste heat for heating purposes.

Not highly optimistic, only a little optimistic to assume all of the heat from the engine will heat my home. Perhaps 85%, is a more reasonable figure, similar to a condensing gas boiler. This still a COP of around 150% and is much cheaper to run than electricity of a condensing gas boiler.

I don't know what the actual cost of a gas powered heat pump is. Yes it would be more expensive, but typically the cost of the heat pump itself is only a small proportion of the total system. At least with a gas powered system, I know it would pay for itself, unlike an electric one. If I've changed my heating to be heat pump compatible and the market changes, I can always move to electric in the future.

Uh ... I mean, I am sorry, but ... that doesn't make a whole lot of sense!?

If you work from the assumption that the majority of the costs of switching to a heat pump are independent from the energy source used by the heat pump, then that implies that switching to a gas-driven heat pump would require the same investment as switching to an electrically driven heat pump. And probably at least a bit more, as you seem to agree. Which also presumably is considerably more than staying with your current system/replacing it with a new gas boiler (as otherwise an electric heat pump would be close to cost parity, based on operating costs alone)? And that difference is supposed to be paid for by a reduction in gas consumption of only 38% even based on your own highly optimistic efficiency calculation?!

I mean, I am not saying that it couldn't end up cheaper overall, but I think you are overstating the certainty a lot when you say that you know that it would pay for itself, given the uncertainty of energy supply costs, and the relatively small efficiency gain of a (small) gas-driven heat pump vs. just burning the gas for heat.

To be honest, changing to a heat pump, whether it's powered from electricity, or gas wouldn't be worth it for me at the moment because my energy usage is too low for it to matter. It's really a thought experiment.

[nctnico]

There is no such thing as a delicate balance.

You are aware that you are in disagreement with about everyone who does research in that area professionally, right?

Citation needed... Maybe you should actually do some research into the subject like I did for over 25 years already.

If you start looking carefully you'll notice that a lot of data is being filled in by assumptions and thus the 'conclusion' is only an assumption. Trying to model something erratic as weather / climate is next to impossible so anyone claiming to have an absolute truth in that area is leaving out a lot of details which may even prove that person wrong. There are some long term effects (like recurring CO2 peaks every 40000 years, long term/short term sun cycles, cold / hot periods centuries ago, etc, etc) which are not explained by models used for global warming. In the end global warming predictions are a line fitted onto the temperatures from the last 100 years with the assumption that CO2 levels are the major factor driving the temperature up.

In fact, there are several other way more pressing issues which make that we should stop burning fossil fuels:

1) Burning fossil fuels is very bad for our health. We should have switched to nuclear a long time ago. Even with some more nuclear power plants blowing up, this would have saved and continue to save millions of lifes.

2) The CO2 level in the atmosphere is creeping up to levels where CO2 becomes toxic to humans, animals and even plants. Look at the coral reefs as an example.

3) Fossil fuels are finite. Once they run out, there has to be an alternative or society will collapse.

4) Taking rising CO2 levels out of the equation as a cause of continued global warming.

Now look at this list through the eyes of a politician. Fear is an effective driver to make people vote for you. So which point to latch onto for a fear mongering campaign? Point 1 will get a lot of pushback from environmentalists who are dead set against nuclear. CO2 toxic? Finite fuels? Global warming? Global warming has a nice ring to it and there are alarmists claiming the world will end if we don't do something so that is free publicity. Notice that the effects of global warming are on the longest term of all the points I listed and there is no certainty stopping burning fossil fuels will actually stop global warming.

IOW there is a good reason that people are getting fed up with fear mongering and start to vote for right wing politicians which want to continue burning fossil fuels. In turn this circles back that renewable energy sources and reduction of energy usage needs to be made cheap enough for the masses.

[Zero999]

Is this what this forum has become?  5% useful posts on actual heatpump data, 95% argument?

Something about heatpumps brings out the crazies, not just this forum. So the OP asking for honest answers (being overwhelmed by the noise) is fully understandable.

Because it's political. I'm not going to get into who's right and wrong in this post, just explain why many get emotional about it, briefly outlining both points of view.

Many western governments are implementing net zero policies and are pushing associated technologies such as heat pumps and electric cars. On one side there are those who strongly support such measures, which they see as important to combat the existential threat posed by climate change.  On the other side, there are those who see such policies as unwanted state interference and authoritarianism and that it is such governments themselves who are the existential threat, rather than climate change.

[Someone]

Is this what this forum has become?  5% useful posts on actual heatpump data, 95% argument?

Something about heatpumps brings out the crazies, not just this forum. So the OP asking for honest answers (being overwhelmed by the noise) is fully understandable.

Because it's political. I'm not going to get into who's right and wrong in this post, just explain why many get emotional about it, briefly outlining both points of view.

But the only politics seems to be in the supply/price of natural resources. Nothing to do with the heat pump.

All it needs is people plainly stating the reason why they think their position, instead of non specific unarguable generalisations.

Most of this thread is UK people dodging the fact that their energy costs are abnormal, while making all sorts of big claims about the rest of the world. Obnoxious colonialism vibes.

[Zero999]

Is this what this forum has become?  5% useful posts on actual heatpump data, 95% argument?

Something about heatpumps brings out the crazies, not just this forum. So the OP asking for honest answers (being overwhelmed by the noise) is fully understandable.

Because it's political. I'm not going to get into who's right and wrong in this post, just explain why many get emotional about it, briefly outlining both points of view.

But the only politics seems to be in the supply/price of natural resources. Nothing to do with the heat pump.

All it needs is people plainly stating the reason why they think their position, instead of non specific unarguable generalisations.

Most of this thread is UK people dodging the fact that their energy costs are abnormal, while making all sorts of big claims about the rest of the world. Obnoxious colonialism vibes.

And from my position, I see this thread as a load of Europeans lecturing us Brits telling us what to do.

Are you trolling now by mentioning colonialism? It's irrelevant. It has nothing to do with colonialism and all to so with people making generalisations, which is inherent to human nature.  The Europeans and Americans do the same thing.

I accept what might be the most economical solution for me, won't be the case for others. For the purposes of this thread, it doesn't matter why energy prices are what they are. It's outside the scope of this forum.

[coppice]

And from my position, I see this thread as a load of Europeans lecturing us Brits telling us what to do.

Nobody can tell someone from another part of the world how to deal with resource hungry things (e.g. energy), or their environment. Supply chains and environments are so location specific. This probably has a lot to do with people misinterpreting what they see and read, because they are projecting from their own position.

[Siwastaja]

And from my position, I see this thread as a load of Europeans lecturing us Brits telling us what to do.

Not at all. You would be a fool not to take advantage of the very cheap natural gas. That said, on the level of country, it's sad to see how expensive electricity is for you, because electricity is so flexible and useful.

[AVGresponding]

As it happens, we are installing an air-source heat pump at a community youth centre we are rewiring. I shall provide some pics and COP info at some point in the near future...

[zilp]

I'm just not going to discuss net zero, propaganda and taxes. They're political and will just result in pages of arguing, with neither of us agreeing. I just don't support it. You clearly do. We'll just have to disagree and leave it at that.

That is simply a lie. You did discuss just that, as I quoted above. You just don't want to defend your position when challenged. If you didn't want to discuss it, you wouldn't have mentioned it in the first place.

Now it appears you're tying to provoke me, which will not work. I'm more than capable of defending my position.

You really need to pay attention. I didn't say you wouldn't be capable of defending your position. I said you didn't want to defend your position. Look at it, it's right there in the quote that you are responding to. Now, you aren't trying to tell me that you wrote "I'm just not going to discuss net zero, propaganda and taxes" because you wanted to tell me that you were intent on defending your position, are you?

Indeed I consider it to be fairly obvious.

I supposed as much. But you do notice how that is a pointless statement to make, right?

I just do not want to discuss the matter here any more.

Which might be true or not. But that doesn't change that it is dishonest to first throw out a statement that you know is controversial, to say the least, and then pretend that it's a claim that you don't want to talk about. Obviously, you would be willing to talk about it further if you were getting agreement. If it were in fact something that you didn't want to talk about, you wouldn't talk about it. But you obviously did talk about it. And you obviously weren't forced to, either.

For one it's against the rules of this forum and secondly I know from previous experience it's impossible to discuss such matters in a logical manner with those who resort to accusations of lying.

It's funny how the problem apparently is that someone is pointing out that you are in fact lying, isn't it?

It's just that you don't actually know that. Whether replacing a gas boiler with an electric heat pump now is a net profitable decision depends heavily on the development of energy supply costs and the purchase price and installation costs of heat pumps over the lifetime of that (hypothetical) heat pump. And as you don't know any of these to a particularly high degree of certainty, you also can't necessarily know whether installing a heat pump now would lose you money.

I have done the calculations,  as has someone else here, who is also an advocate of heat pumps.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/what-is-the-real-story-around-heat-pumps/msg5347484/#msg5347484

Nowhere in that post that you are linking to is there any attempt to model the future costs of the respective systems, so that obviously is not a relevant response to what I wrote. And also, it is obviously nonsensical to say that you have done the calculations in response to me pointing out that you don't know the numbers that you would need to do the calculation without saying a single word about how you do know the numbers after all.

One thing that is pretty likely, though, for a variety of reasons, is that the price differential between gas and electricity will shrink, and possibly even invert, which at the very least means that betting on gas is not a particularly safe bet.

And guess what. If it becomes economical for me to buy an electric heat pump, then can do it. It's just uneconomical at the moment. I don't see why you appear to be having difficulty understanding that.

Because that isn't how economics works. To make an obvious example to illustrate the problem: If gas goes to 50 p per kWh tomorrow and stays there for the next ten years while electricity doesn't change, then the total costs of an electric heat pump installed at current prices would probably be lower than a gas boiler. But at that point, because of that change in gas price, the installation costs for heat pumps will shoot up, because the supply of heat pumps and of heat pump installation work is close to fixed in the mid term, so the massively increasing demand will drive the price up (to the new equlibrium point), so you can't actually buy a heat pump at that price then anymore.

You are essentially saying that you can still buy gold tomorrow if you see that the price has increased.

And just to be clear: No, 50 p per kWh tomorrow is not likely. The point is to create an obvious example to illustrate the problem. Though we did see similar scenarios play out at the start (or whatever you want to call February 2022) of the Ukraine war: People who had installed heat pumps or solar systems recently at prices where they weren't expecting break even any time soon, if at all, at the then-current energy prices suddenly realized that they had made a profitable investment, while others, who got the idea to avoid the increased energy prices by putting in renewable sources found that the prices for doing so had adjusted to the point where it wasn't a clear win anymore.

... which assumes that the exhaust will be at outdoor temperature (i.e., your heating water return is below outdoor temperature?) and at the same absolute humidity as outdoor air (which indeed would be likely with outdoor-temperature exhaust ... but not so much in reality)!?

Also, I don't know all that much about the power regulation of combustion engines, but I think that they at the very least have a relatively narrow band of rotational speed where they reach maximum efficiency, and I suspect that exhaust temperature is part of that equation and thus can not be varied continuously to match the water heat exchanger without sacrificing mechanical efficiency!?

Which is to say: It seems highly optimistic to me to assume that you could capture 100% of the waste heat for heating purposes.

Not highly optimistic, only a little optimistic to assume all of the heat from the engine will heat my home. Perhaps 85%, is a more reasonable figure, similar to a condensing gas boiler. This still a COP of around 150% and is much cheaper to run than electricity of a condensing gas boiler.

It's just that I don't see any reason to assume that you would be able to achieve that efficiency, which is what I was trying to tell you. The efficiency of a condensing boiler comes from low temperatures, which is what allows the condensation to happen. But for one, it isn't obvious that you can actually control the exhaust temperature that well without sacrificing mechanical efficiency, because, see above. But also, you then have the choice to either use the exhaust to heat up the return before the heat pump, which is at the lower temperature and thus allows for more condensation, but which drives up the return temperature seen by the heat pump and thus reduces the efficiency of the heat pump, or you can heat up further at the output of the heat pump, in which case you get higher efficiency of the heat pump, but higher temperature in the exhaust heat exchanger and thus less condensation and thus lower efficiency in the use of waste heat.

To be honest, changing to a heat pump, whether it's powered from electricity, or gas wouldn't be worth it for me at the moment because my energy usage is too low for it to matter. It's really a thought experiment.

Well, yeah, sure, but I would think that it wouldn't be an obvious economic win even if your heat use was closer to the average.

(And for that matter, it wouldn't necessarily be an ecological win either to swap out a working gas boiler that isn't used that much overall ...)