Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

Eokokok t1_jeg35d6 wrote

Reply to comment by AcademicGravy in Heat Pumps could supply 20% of building heating by 2030. Supercritical CO2 heat pump sales in Japan have now reached a total of 8.5 million units. by DisasterousGiraffe

Most modern, as in currently sold lineups of home range units, systems use R32, which has significantly lower impact than 410a while not being dreadfully inefficient in low temperatures...

So no, switching to CO2 is not really a way to go, it never was, is might be a great idea to sell heat pumps for users that need high temp, but those should not really be using heat pumps in the first place most of the time so yeah, great thing.

−2

AcademicGravy t1_jeg3vvj wrote

R-32 is 675 times worse than co2 in regards to GWP. I would say that is a significant improvement. Also 410-A heat pumps are capable of heating down to -25 C so not really dreadfully inefficient in low temperatures.

7

Eokokok t1_jeg5f1f wrote

You have no idea how heat pumps work, do you...

I run installation company. I sell heat pumps for a living. I'm certified home and industrial heating/cooling systems technician. And with this intro CO2 pumps suck.

To put it simply - your average 10kW unit can produce that 10kW at output water temp of 35C and outdoor temp of 7C, CO2 lineup is sold with different 'scaling' so to speak, so it might get that 10kW output at 7C outside for water of 70C, but because it's inefficient it won't have COP of 4 but more in the range of 2,4-2,6.

And at -7 your normal pump gets still ~8,5kW of heat output but CO2 will get like 6 or less... And COP nearing standard electric heater. Even for not max output temperature.

Let me say this again and again - if you need a high temp pump you should insulate your building in the first place. Than buy low temp pump. If you don't have money for both you should insulate your building first and not waste time and money for high temp pumps.

So what is presented as great environmental move is just wasting limited resources on marketing gimmick that avoids addressing main issue being outdated building standards for insulation and heating installation.

3

AcademicGravy t1_jeg9kgz wrote

I am a red seal refrigeration and AC mechanic with 10 years of experience and I own my own HVAC company. I'd like to think I have a pretty good understanding of heat pumps.

I merely stated the purpose of using co2 over other refrigerants, I don't think you can argue co2 has a much better gwp than alternative gases.

I agree houses should be better insulated first before installing a heat pump. There is no high temp or low temp heat pump, I assume you mean installing a heat pump with higher BTU capacity vs using a smaller system.

A COP of an electric heater would be about 1. I've never heard of a heat pump with that bad of a COP lol.

Surely you know R-22 was considered a better gas than 410-A yet we switched for enviromental purposes. It may be the case that we do it again. It's not that big of a deal and I'm not really sure why you seem to hate the concept so much. Even if a co2 unit is less efficient the net effect on the enviroment is probably going to be positive, especially if we can focus on solar and other clean ways of producing electricity.

9

Eokokok t1_jegawli wrote

CO2 is better than other things GWP-wise, true, but it has no place in home installations given everything about it.

There is one place where it makes sense, system which accounts for probably most lost refrigerants while not caring about efficiency that much - car AC/pumps. And guess where they not actually use it forcing proprietary garbage 1234f...

So if CO2 is to be pushed for environmental reasons it should be used were power and efficiency is less of an issue than leaks, but hey, it's never about environment in the first place is it...

1

AcademicGravy t1_jegcukk wrote

Consider if every home was heated with a co2 unit. In that case there would be a lot of potential leaks but since it's co2 it's not that big of a concern. The units wouldn't be as efficient but if all our electricity was produced with renewables it wouldn't really matter.

If every unit was R-32 than yes it might be more efficient but leaks could cause some damage to the climate.

Tough to say for sure which one would be better for the enviroment but I think end goal currently should be co2 heat pumps and solar panels on every well insulated house. Don't think we have a better set up enviroment wise right now than that.

5

rafa-droppa t1_jeg9drv wrote

To me the interesting idea is industrial uses.

Take steel making for example, you have molten iron at one stage, then at a later stage you water cool it.

With further engineering you could pump the heat from the water cooling stage to heat the container of molten iron.

Obviously we're a far way from using heat exchangers to melt iron, but the point is if you can work out something like a preheat so you're heating the iron to 200F before melting it you can use a lot less energy, plus you save energy and water from the water cooling process.

So if you could reduce energy used in steelmaking by like 10% and water by 20% - that would be huge globally.

1