UK government hires ‘nudge unit’ to help dispel heat pump myths
www.theguardian.com
Behaviour experts say misinformation shared in media and by other stakeholders is impeding uptake
  • federal reverse@feddit.org
    58·
    6 days ago

    Almost like there is a coordinated campaign by gas & oil lobbyists across the globe. Curious.

    (Greetings from Germany where the government had the goal of helping 500k heat pumps get installed in 2024. People installed 200k heat pumps, but 500k gas/oil furnaces. This follows a solid year 2022/2023 of concentrated disinformation campaigns about heat pumps.)

    • federal reverse@feddit.org
      621·
      6 days ago

      Caveat: In Europe, heat pumps usually provide either no or less effective cooling though, because our heatings usually use water as the medium rather than air like in the US. And heat pumps are usually connected with a buffer tank, in many cases that’s a combination hot drinkable water + heating water tank.

      Water as the medium means cooling is usually less effective. And if you fuck up that buffer tank, cooling doesn’t work at all.

      • AbsentBird@lemm.eeEnglish
        9·
        6 days ago

        Many of the highest efficiency heat pumps in the world are operating in Europe. How does water lower efficiency?

            • gasgiant@lemmy.ml
              4·
              6 days ago

              My opinion is that it isn’t. If it can remove heat then it will cool the same as air AC.

              However it comes with the problem of condensation everywhere. So those room radiators that give off heat in the winter will be dripping with condensation in the summer. As will all the system pipework that isn’t fully insulated and protected.

              So that’s probably a lot of water running different places in the home.

      • gasgiant@lemmy.ml
        6·
        6 days ago

        You’re a bit confused about buffer tanks. They are thermal stores and just store primary heating circuit water.

        The water from the buffer tank isn’t the hot water from the tap. The water in the buffer tank will be used to indirectly heat mains water. Either through a plate heat exchanger or an unvented cylinder.

        • federal reverse@feddit.org
          32·
          6 days ago

          I am not confused, although maybe my wording was confusing.

          My point is, that generally speaking, you can’t use water from the same tank to heat your drinking water and to cool your home (because it mixes and the resulting temperature will fill neither requirement). There are of course tons of variants of buffer tanks, and in some cases there are bypasses or there’s a physical separation between heating water and (water used to heat) drinking water

  • Drusas@fedia.io
    31·
    6 days ago

    Where is this misinformation? I have never heard anyone say anything bad about heat pumps.

  • Drusas@fedia.io
    21·
    6 days ago

    To be fair, heat pumps are noisy. I’ve lived in two houses with heat pumps now and my nextdoor neighbor has one. All of them are loud. They’re still worth it.

    • federal reverse@feddit.org
      10·
      6 days ago

      Not really. Older ones are loud, small/underpowered ones are loud but new, larger, correctly sized, modulating heat pumps can be fairly quiet.

      • Drusas@fedia.io
        5·
        6 days ago

        The first one I experienced was definitely small and underpowered and I hated it because it couldn’t keep up with 80°F+ temperatures. And it was fucking loud.

        The two more recent ones I have had experience with are only a few years old, appropriately sized, and much more capable. They’re not quite as loud, but still noisy.

        As someone who is somewhat sensitive to sound, I couldn’t stand the first one. The current one that I have, I often don’t notice that it’s on until it turns off and I suddenly feel a rush of relief that it’s quiet again.

        So they do have at least one downside. At least my current one can keep up with whatever weather comes our way.