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The critical problem they’re trying to solve is the spark gap — the premium that is charged for a joule of electricity vs a joule of gas, which exists because the marginal generation today is provided by operating a gas-burning turbine. Making heat pumps cheaper, both at installation time and for operations, is key for mass adoption, which is necessary if we’re going to stop burning fossil fuels.

  • CompactFlaxEnglish
    5·
    9 days ago

    a/c units shouldn’t exist

    I concur. I think there’s two good reasons why and one bad one.

    1. Cold climate heat pumps are a reasonably recent creation and have different configuration/refrigerant characteristics than a standard AC unit. If I’m not mistaken, they’re less good at cooling than a straight AC to allow the larger operating range, which might be notable in the southern states
    2. USA manufacturers have not been developing their own cold climate air to air heat pumps. Until the rebates kicked off, cold climate heat pumps were very specialized equipment that trades weren’t familiar with. Now, the ones that are being installed with USA brands are almost invariably Midea or another Chinese brand (and some Japanese).
    3. Why sell a heat pump with reversing valve for the same or similar price when you can double it?

    Also, electricity costs so much more than gas in the USA that if there’s a gas main, it is often cheaper to run a gas furnace at 70% efficiency.