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ACorania t1_j9daa7p wrote

Reply to comment by LifeIsARollerCoaster in Heat Pumps Sell Like Hotcakes on America's Oil-Rich Frontier by dolphins3

If they can afford the upfront costs. The poorest of the population and renters will still be living without these.

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[deleted] t1_j9dchfi wrote

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ACorania t1_j9di8sv wrote

It depends who is on the hook for the cost. If the heat just runs up the electric and that is the renters responsibility, then the Landlord doesn't really have an incentive to care. If they replace it then the renter sees the savings, not them.

If the landlord is responsible for the costs... yeah, I bet they are all over it.

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Hvarfa-Bragi t1_j9fcqkx wrote

Everywhere I rented apartments in Arizona came with a heat pump that I had to pay the electric for, landlords didn't profit directly.

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netz_pirat t1_j9fb0gc wrote

It's a bit of renter's vs landlord market as well.

If the available renter has a budget of 1500$ for rent and utilities, you bet the landlord has an interest in efficient appliances so he can charge a higher percentage of those 1500$.

Now, if the renters have to be happy to find a place at all, it doesn't matter that much unfortunately...

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burkins89 t1_j9er3fm wrote

Up in my area of the northwest a lot of landlords don’t care one bit and some older rental houses are uninsulated and still running former coal furnaces retrofit to gas.

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series_hybrid t1_j9frrmi wrote

I oncelived where there very old houses on one side of town.

Wrap-around porches shaded the ground floor. Basement stayed cool even in hottest summers and canned foods were stored there.

I've seen homes that were not that old, and built to rent. No overhang/shade, no basement, no insulation, no garage

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lupuscapabilis t1_j9g4bdg wrote

>Wrap-around porches shaded the ground floor.

I can't believe that never occurred to me. I moved into a new house last year that has a wraparound porch for half the house (right next to the living room) and I was struck by how comfortable it was in there during the summer. I was used to sweltering any time the temp hit 80F.

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series_hybrid t1_j9ggu7q wrote

Contractors build what customers buy, not what is smart. I'll give you a great example.

If you are surrounded by free trees, you might consider a wood-burning stove, like the Franklin style.

But what size to buy? Plus you have to gather and chop the wood. People buy the large one because it "looks right", and they have yo keep adding wood frequently.

Where does the air come from that feeds the fire? There is n adjustable opening right now the lower front, so...it takes-in air from the room. Air that you burned wood to warm.

The fire is 1500F, so it doesn't care if you feed it 20F air from outside, or 70F air from the room. People heat the air in the room, and then throw half of it away up the chimney.

Duct some air from the outside to the intake, and you will only need to burn half the wood.

The wood is free, but, you just cut your gathering and chopping in half.

Plus now, you realize you can buy the smaller stove, and sell the big one.

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OhItsNotJoe t1_j9fwosm wrote

My landlord had a heat pump installed in my rental just recently and I asked him about it. For context: It’s a student rental in an area that gets cold winters and hot summers. Because he takes the electric cost from vacationers in the summer it’s more efficient to have a heat pump that can do both AC for them and heat for me in the winter. It simplified the things he has to worry about/repair, plus saves me money on the electric bill (which he then up charges the rent of course).

[obligatory fuck landlords, we’re better off without them]

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LifeIsARollerCoaster t1_j9dcyzy wrote

I bought a cheap electric space heater for under $50. It’s not the same as a heat pump but it works and I am not burning oil to use it.

Demand spurs mass production which lowers costs. Quite sure heat pumps will majorly drop in price in the next few years as there is high demand

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ACorania t1_j9dil7z wrote

I could be wrong, but I think in general that space heaters are the most expensive way to heat. More than gas in most situations.

Obviously it depends on if you are heating the same amount of space, the relative efficiency of your specific situation, etc. etc... but as a general rule, space heaters are the most costly form of heating.

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series_hybrid t1_j9ftmhm wrote

If I eaten an entire house with a space heater in each room, I would agree with you.

This past winer we had a month that was colder than normal, and that month we paid $300 to heat. The following month we turned the central heat way down, dressed warmer, and used a space-heater in the small den where we ate and watched TV

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lupuscapabilis t1_j9g3ba9 wrote

For some reason people tend to just get stuck on the "space heaters are expensive" thing even though most of us use them to temporarily supplement the heat and not use them to heat the whole house. I've never seen any significant increase in electric bill from occasionally using a space heater.

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LifeIsARollerCoaster t1_j9ds4fk wrote

Electric space heaters are close to 100% energy efficient. Gas heaters have over 80% energy efficiency. That’s the physics part. The cost part depends on the price of gas and price of electricity. If gas prices are higher like in the last few months or If you have solar panels then the cost of electricity is less and you will save money like I did by using a space heater

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_craq_ t1_j9en1sy wrote

Heat pumps get 200-300% efficiency.

For people whose electricity is generated from gas, you should include the efficiency of generating electricity in your calculation. So a space heater would be ~50%, but a heat pump still beats direct gas heating.

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ghostridur t1_j9fyld3 wrote

There are 100000 btus in a therm of natural gas and 3142 btus in a kwh of electric so using $1.316 of gas for heating is equivalent to $5.506 in electricity for a space heater at the current rates I am paying for ng and electric. Heat pumps probably won't catch on as much in the north for heating we mostly use them for cooling in the summer. Even with a crank case heater and an auxiliary heat grid inside the head getting below 5 they really struggle.

I'll stick with my 96.3% furnace for now. The premature push to have everything all electric is just a good way to sell more natural gas to electric power companies for generation. Just costs the end user more money.

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LifeIsARollerCoaster t1_j9g3pc0 wrote

The math is different for people who have solar panels or those who have much higher gas prices

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porican t1_j9dpfpn wrote

not burning oil but unless your ESCO uses only sustainable sources you’re probably still burning coal

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LifeIsARollerCoaster t1_j9dshpy wrote

My state is phasing out coal. Currently it’s less than .5% of the state power supply

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[deleted] t1_j9edslj wrote

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LifeIsARollerCoaster t1_j9fbvwp wrote

So if a California power company buys power from a coal power plant in Utah you equate that to say that California exports pollution. Amazing!

Surely the Utah power plant has a choice to generate power from other sources no?

Don’t worry that deal won’t go on for long, along with the money and jobs. California has a 100% renewable power mandate so it will be phased out. They have been adding a ton of power storage projects to manage the intermittency of renewable power

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