Comment The UK declared a national emergency this week during a historic heat wave that melted runways, snarled train journeys and broke temperature records. The disaster was particularly acute in a country like England, where 95 percent of the population does not have air conditioning. In it, the British government provided grant money to a little-known solution: heat pumps. Misleadingly named, heat pumps are two-way air conditioners that move warm air from inside a home to outside, keeping residences cool in the warmer months. In the winter months they do the opposite, taking heat energy from outside and pushing warm air inside. Energy officials, lawmakers and scientists tout the devices as inexpensive, energy-efficient systems that significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions compared to traditional heating and cooling devices. Estimates show that 90 percent of Japanese households use heat pumps to heat and cool homes, helping to reduce the country’s electricity consumption by 40 percent over the past decade. In Italy, the government essentially pays citizens to use the technology. Homeowners can be reimbursed for 110 percent of the cost of the heat pump. Europe faced wildfires spreading and the death toll rising amid extreme heat on July 18. (Video: Alexa Juliana Ard, Rick Noack/The Washington Post) However, the devices lack popularity in parts of the United States and Europe due to low public awareness and high installation costs. The UK fell well short of its annual heat pump installation targets in 2021. Energy experts point to a few reasons why heat pumps haven’t entered the mainstream. First is the name, which makes it difficult for people to recognize that it heats and cools. “It’s confusing,” said Corinne Schneider, the chief communications officer for CLASP, an energy nonprofit. The dome of brutal heat is moving east, with Central Europe suffocating High installation costs — systems can cost upwards of $10,000 to purchase and install — are also a barrier for many users. But with a heat wave forcing people to find ways to cool their homes as Russia’s war in Ukraine sends energy prices skyrocketing, experts say heat pumps are a natural solution: an all-in system -one that cools during heat waves and reduces dependence on gas in the winter. “It’s a matter of comfort at home. It’s a matter of climate. It’s a security issue,” said Alexander Gard-Murray, a climate change researcher and economist at Brown University’s Climate Solutions Lab. “Each of these would be enough to aggressively move heat pumps, but together I think the evidence is insurmountable.” The technology behind heat pumps can be traced back to the 1940s, when American inventor Robert C. Webber created a prototype copper pipe heating unit in his basement. Over the years, Webber’s creation inspired the key technology that allowed modern refrigerators to transfer heat from the back of a refrigerator, keeping the interior cool. There are two main types of heat pumps. In the warmer months, air source heat pumps draw warm air from a room, blow it over a coil and pass it through a refrigerant so that the cold air is brought back inside. In the cold months, the pump captures heat energy from outside air and cycles it through the machine to heat it and blow it inside. These pumps are similar in size to central air conditioning units. Ground source heat pumps transfer the heat stored in the Earth into a building during the winter and transfer it outside during the summer. These are less common and more expensive than air source options. One of the most common complaints about heat pumps, experts said, was that they would stop providing heat on very cold days. But advances in heat pump compressors have made them more efficient, cost-effective and successful in providing heat at lower temperatures. Heaps of extreme heat in Europe’s summer travel chaos As heat pumps have improved, lawmakers and policy experts have sought to make the devices more mainstream. In the United States, a tax credit program provides about $300 in rebates for people who convert their homes to heat pump technology. Amid Congress’ deadlock on the climate agenda, one proposal raises the incentive to $600. States and local utilities also have their own rebate programs. The benefits to pocketbooks and the climate are said to be significant, climate experts said. In the United States, about 16,000 air conditioning units are installed every day on average. Researchers from CLASP and Harvard University predicted that if, over the rest of the decade, all homes that install central air conditioners bought a subsidized heat pump, consumers would save about $27 billion on their heating and cooling bills while reducing greenhouse gas emissions. of the greenhouse by 49 million tons of carbon. dioxide by 2032. The researchers note that much of the savings is due to a heat pump’s ability to heat homes up to 50 percent more efficiently than furnaces and water boilers. CLASP’s Schneider said Europe’s heat wave is the right time for heat pump technology to become more mainstream, as many are buying air conditioners for the first time. Other researchers note that the stakes are high. “Every day this [people] fail to install as many heat pumps as possible, this means they are locked into greater reliance on [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and Russian gas this winter,” said Gard-Murray of Brown University. Sam Calisch, heat pump specialist at Rewiring America, added that because climate change is making heat waves more common, cooling devices will need to be low-emissions. “More and more places that didn’t have air conditioning in general are getting it,” he said. “So whenever that happens, we have to think about heat pumps because that allows us to write off some of the fossil fuel demand that we have right now.” Extreme heat prompts warnings in 28 states as Texas and Oklahoma hit 115 Because heat pumps cost a lot, spending the money can seem difficult. And because most people buy air conditioners and heating units when they have to, they often have little time to decide what to buy, Schneider said. They end up with what is common in stores or recommended by maintenance professionals. “If you’re in a heating or cooling emergency … you’re going to get whatever’s in stock,” he said. “There needs to be a way for HVAC installers to increase their inventory of this technology and be aware of it.”
