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Sat Mar 01, 2025 4:04 pm

raygreenwood wrote: I was really surprised when I moved back to Oklahoma that it's really common in order to get your heat pump equipped system to keep up with heating when it drops into the mid to high 20s.....they are all equipped with what is called "EM heat" mode.

When the heat pump cannot keep up in colder weather, the gas furnace kicks in in EM heat mode and they both run.

Ray
Several folks I know up in IA run heat pumps with geothermal wells (they are mostly out in county, so generally have the room for the shallower horizontal well systems). They seem to be able to easily keep their homes heated with them in the winter, even reportedly down into the -20° F range (or worse) on occasion — ?!? If true, I find that impressive!

But of course IA has plenty of deep topsoil and dirt to dig the geothermal wells down into. OK, on the other hand, is a lot more rocky and often hard/expensive (or even impossible) to sink those sorts of wells into. So yeah, can see how you’d likely need some supplemental heat (e.g. from propane or natural gas burners) if using a heat pump in winter down there.

Sat Mar 01, 2025 8:05 pm

I looked into heat pumps/geothermal when I built

problem is (or was at the time) geo here makes between 40-65* depending on how deep you go and it's not very consistent.

The heat pumps had basically an electric heating probe to help with cold weather heating. A the time, the calculated electric bill would have been about 600/mo and would for sure be double, if not more than that today.

Sun Mar 02, 2025 12:36 pm

They are pushing heat pump conversion in the San Fran Bay Area. most use gas. we have frequent black outs, and limited electric sources for the current demand. Yet they keep pushing it, with rebates paid by utility customers.
I did the math, it is much too expensive an upgrade for payback for me. My simple, easy to maintain gas furnace is the most economical choice, and will out last the heat pumps which are complex, with more parts to fail. Plus I dont want some big ugly noisy cold coil in my backyard.

Electric prices are skyrocketing now with the increased demand thanks to electric cars, and conversions of homes to electric, plus all the new homes being built, then we have the electric supply decreasing with regular reliable power plants closing, and only expensive, unreliable wind or solar to take their place.

this is a recipe for disaster, the rulers that mandate this crap are clueless in regards to the practical engineering that is dooming their plans to disaster. They has all swallowed the net zero gobal warming hoax, and are blindly running headlong into disaster.

Sun Mar 02, 2025 1:11 pm

If you’ve got any sort of air conditioning in your house (excluding swamp coolers), then you’re already running a heat pump — it just happens to be one that’s “uni-directional” (i.e. can only move heat from inside your house to the outside), rather than “reversible” (i.e. one that can move the heat in either direction). A/C units are of course pretty common nowadays in most areas of the country, so I really don’t consider installing a heat pump to be all that much of an “added complexity” issue.

Their main drawback (as stated earlier) is that they don’t operate all that efficiently when outside air temperatures get into extreme cold or hot ranges. A geothermal well can be used to greatly boost their efficiency, but those wells are often cost-prohibitive to dig/drill/install. Hence why I think majority of country still relies on natural gas or propane furnaces for home heating in cooler seasons — it just makes the most sense $$$-wise.

Sun Mar 02, 2025 3:40 pm

I don’t know what you’re doing in CA, up here in WA they have been pushing heat pumps too, but our electricity rates have gone up slightly slower than inflation. Over the decades since I got married electricity has increased about 2.5 times over what it cost back in the 1980’s. Over the same time the CPI has increased about 2.8 times. In real terms it has become slightly cheaper. Almost every new home has a heat pump, but in western WA that actually simplifies things if you want AC (don’t need 2 systems) and it has become expected in new homes.

We recently used the initiative process to NOT allow WA state to take the natural gas option away from replacements or new homes. Handy for me (I worked on that campaign) as I would have to redo my old 125 amp electric system, and it works perfectly fine.

I’ve built EVs and driven others. I always charged on a 120 volt outlet, something still offered on most new EVs. A 120 outlet charges an EV about 4 miles per hour (a 240 vac standard home EV charger is more like 15 to 20 miles per hour). EVs use around 1/2 kWh per mile of range so if you know your electrical rate you can estimate your “fuel” cost. Don’t forget to factor in your states electric vehicle extra registration tax ($225 per year in WA, and 11¢ per kWh where I’m at).

Sun Mar 02, 2025 6:14 pm

baldessariclan wrote: If you’ve got any sort of air conditioning in your house (excluding swamp coolers), then you’re already running a heat pump — it just happens to be one that’s “uni-directional” (i.e. can only move heat from inside your house to the outside), rather than “reversible” (i.e. one that can move the heat in either direction). A/C units are of course pretty common nowadays in most areas of the country, so I really don’t consider installing a heat pump to be all that much of an “added complexity” issue.

Their main drawback (as stated earlier) is that they don’t operate all that efficiently when outside air temperatures get into extreme cold or hot ranges. A geothermal well can be used to greatly boost their efficiency, but those wells are often cost-prohibitive to dig/drill/install. Hence why I think majority of country still relies on natural gas or propane furnaces for home heating in cooler seasons — it just makes the most sense $$$-wise.

The simplicity of my furnace is evident compared to any heat pump or AC unit. Much fewer parts to deal with, smaller foot print, and a huge savings in total costs. Same for the water heater conversion thing that is being pushed. It aint practical for me, and should not be forced on people, nor should other be forced to pay for it, plus it is insanity to convert to all electric cars and homes without having the electrical generation and transport needs met first. I dont see any plan to meet the electric needs. We is heading for disaster with this scheme. The people in charge have not thought this through. :cry:

Mon Mar 03, 2025 1:19 am

skills@eurocarsplus wrote: I looked into heat pumps/geothermal when I built

problem is (or was at the time) geo here makes between 40-65* depending on how deep you go and it's not very consistent.

The heat pumps had basically an electric heating probe to help with cold weather heating. A the time, the calculated electric bill would have been about 600/mo and would for sure be double, if not more than that today.

That’s old school, skills.

You can get heat pumps that maintain full efficiency at 0F, and 80% at -20F , with no electric or gas backup needed.

It doesn’t pay to replace a functioning unit with a heat pump, but when your current unit reaches EOL, it usually does payout to go that route.

Mon Mar 03, 2025 4:06 am

A friend of ours set up his acreage with thermowells and heat pumps. He told me it does not work at -20*C and he has to resort to his electric furnace for backup in the winter.

Mon Mar 03, 2025 7:50 am

I live in the SF bay area and run both heat pump and on demand (Gas) water heater. Never had to worry about blackouts unless there's a big storm...

Both are great, the Climate is pretty mild here and the only real increase in our bill is when we fire up the spa.

The footprint of the heat pump is the same as my old system and the on demand water heater is way smaller.

Mon Mar 03, 2025 8:21 am

Heck, just about everybody has multiple heat pumps in their house nowadays -- e.g. refrigerator, freezer, A/C units, etc. So yeah, once again I see no reason to think of them as all that exotic or exceptionally complicated, per se.

And of course lots of people already use them for cooling their homes in the summer, so we know they can operate relatively efficiently over say a 30-40° F heat differential range -- e.g. moving heat from a from a 70° F interior house temp to a 100° F outside temp, or moving heat from a 35° F refrigerator interior to a 70° F kitchen.

So I see no reason why they couldn't work just as well for heating a house interior, especially when used in conjunction with a geothermal well -- for one of those, the temp. differential range is about the same ballpark as the refrigerator example given above. The cost of digging and installing the well (plus space required, for a horizontal well system) would seem to me to be the only really big obstacles/drawbacks to using a heat pump for heating your home...

Mon Mar 03, 2025 9:14 am

The initial cost for putting a heat pump in my home is much higher than that of a gas heater. I also dont have the space for the external cold coil. It is a much more complex unit that my gas furnace, and electric is very expensive here in green california, and set to keep rising. We simply do not have enough electric here to charge all the cars, heat all the homes, heat all the water, etc...
It is foolish for the rulers to mandate these things without an electric grid that can economically and reliably run these things.
Some folks may love them, and that is fine, some folks also love electric cars. But itis wrong to force them on folks who dont want them, it is wrong to make folks that dont want them to subsidize others that do want them.

Tue Mar 04, 2025 5:44 am

baldessariclan wrote: Heck, just about everybody has multiple heat pumps in their house nowadays -- e.g. refrigerator, freezer, A/C units, etc. So yeah, once again I see no reason to think of them as all that exotic or exceptionally complicated, per se.

And of course lots of people already use them for cooling their homes in the summer, so we know they can operate relatively efficiently over say a 30-40° F heat differential range -- e.g. moving heat from a from a 70° F interior house temp to a 100° F outside temp, or moving heat from a 35° F refrigerator interior to a 70° F kitchen.

So I see no reason why they couldn't work just as well for heating a house interior, especially when used in conjunction with a geothermal well -- for one of those, the temp. differential range is about the same ballpark as the refrigerator example given above. The cost of digging and installing the well (plus space required, for a horizontal well system) would seem to me to be the only really big obstacles/drawbacks to using a heat pump for heating your home...
So what you are saying then is that any heat pump system that fails to be adequate in the winter is just simply undersized?

Tue Mar 04, 2025 7:49 am

oprn wrote: So what you are saying then is that any heat pump system that fails to be adequate in the winter is just simply undersized?
Well, that's one possible reason I suppose. The same could happen if you installed a too small gas-fired furnace for your house, or a central A/C system without enough tonnage of cooling capacity -- the unit obviously needs to be sized adequately for the square footage that it's trying to heat or cool.

This conversation has piqued my curiosity at bit more about heat pumps and their performance, so late yesterday I called and spoke w/ my uncle who lives up in NW Iowa, and uses a heat pump system to heat and cool the family farm house up there. It's a bit older one (installed over 10 years ago, IIRC), and is tied in with a horizontally-oriented geothermal well system.

I remember the house as always being nice and warm whenever I've been up there in the winter. And he confirmed that the heat pump has always worked fine and been able to keep the house heated comfortably, even when they get into the -20° F range or worse on occasion. Note that the house is of fairly modern construction (built in the early 1990's), and so has reasonably good insulation, windows, etc., which probably helps a lot.

Anyway, he told me that his heat pump system does not use any sort of auxiliary electric or gas-fired heating -- it's basically a "stand alone" type of setup. He did say he was aware of some similar systems that use an auxiliary electrical heating element, but that it normally wasn't employed/activated when it was really cold out, but rather would only come on to speed the heating of the house when the owner was trying to rapidly change the internal temperature over a relatively large jump (e.g. house left at 50° F while people are away, and then thermostat set back up to 70° - 75° F when they return).

He also mentioned that while you really do still need a geothermal well for heat pumps to be practical and efficient up in the northern parts of the country & continent, as you get further south the latest heat pump systems supposedly really can be used to heat a house efficiently in the winter, using only air-transfer of heat (no geothermal well required) - ?!? Interesting...

For the record, we still heat with natural gas in our house, plus our water heater, kitchen stove, and gas hearths use it as well, and I'm perfectly fine with all that. But when our current furnace and/or central A/C unit finally gives up the ghost, I'll probably do a bit more studying up on if a heat pump system might be practical (both performance-wise and economically) here or not - we'll see...

Tue Mar 04, 2025 8:37 am

Consider that not everyone has the time left to break even on a heat pump conversion. My home will require a very expensive install, including new wires and electric panel. so even if the heat pump is cheaper to run, the break even point maybe well past the owners life expectancy.
Of course there is still the issue of skyrocketing electric prices, lack of new power plants while electrification is pushed is a real issue.

another thing to consider is in my area, many many homes never had AC, But when people put in the heat pumps per mandate or subsidy pushed by the global warmists, the people now have AC, and they will likely use it, thus increasing power demands during summer time. If folks have AC, they may well stop doing the things that cool for little it any energy use such as opening the house up at night to cool off, then seal up the house, close drapes in morning.
I know of folks who never had AC, but thru rebates got their heat pump and now run the AC all summer too. Such much for being green and reducing energy use.

Tue Mar 04, 2025 9:10 am

AI is going to be a real drain on energy. So now there are two very large competing sources for electricity. AI and EV. Microsoft has even made a deal with a company to restart the 2 mile Nuke plant. They need that much electricity for AI.

Tue Mar 04, 2025 10:05 am

baldessariclan wrote: oprn wrote: So what you are saying then is that any heat pump system that fails to be adequate in the winter is just simply undersized?
Well, that's one possible reason I suppose. The same could happen if you installed a too small gas-fired furnace for your house, or a central A/C system without enough tonnage of cooling capacity -- the unit obviously needs to be sized adequately for the square footage that it's trying to heat or cool.

This conversation has piqued my curiosity at bit more about heat pumps and their performance, so late yesterday I called and spoke w/ my uncle who lives up in NW Iowa, and uses a heat pump system to heat and cool the family farm house up there. It's a bit older one (installed over 10 years ago, IIRC), and is tied in with a horizontally-oriented geothermal well system.

I remember the house as always being nice and warm whenever I've been up there in the winter. And he confirmed that the heat pump has always worked fine and been able to keep the house heated comfortably, even when they get into the -20° F range or worse on occasion. Note that the house is of fairly modern construction (built in the early 1990's), and so has reasonably good insulation, windows, etc., which probably helps a lot.

Anyway, he told me that his heat pump system does not use any sort of auxiliary electric or gas-fired heating -- it's basically a "stand alone" type of setup. He did say he was aware of some similar systems that use an auxiliary electrical heating element, but that it normally wasn't employed/activated when it was really cold out, but rather would only come on to speed the heating of the house when the owner was trying to rapidly change the internal temperature over a relatively large jump (e.g. house left at 50° F while people are away, and then thermostat set back up to 70° - 75° F when they return).

He also mentioned that while you really do still need a geothermal well for heat pumps to be practical and efficient up in the northern parts of the country & continent, as you get further south the latest heat pump systems supposedly really can be used to heat a house efficiently in the winter, using only air-transfer of heat (no geothermal well required) - ?!? Interesting...

For the record, we still heat with natural gas in our house, plus our water heater, kitchen stove, and gas hearths use it as well, and I'm perfectly fine with all that. But when our current furnace and/or central A/C unit finally gives up the ghost, I'll probably do a bit more studying up on if a heat pump system might be practical (both performance-wise and economically) here or not - we'll see...

I just moved back to Oklahoma from Iowa 6 years ago. What is commonly used depends on the area in Iowa and the age and size of the house.

Certain areas on Iowa have strata that make them ideal for geothermal. A lot of people in Davenport that I know say geothermal works well there. In Des Moines....not so much.

The other issue is not that heat pumps are undersized per-se.....it's that American houses are oversized....and it has as much to do with the airflow and du t design inside the house and the inside heat exchanger as it does with the heat pump.

Very quickly you can end up with a heat pump size that might be ideal for a 1500-1800 sq. Ft home....being far too small for a 2000 to 2300 square foot home. But the next one up can generally be too large.

Both issues mean the same thing. In the case of the too small pump, it has to run almost constant. If also the house design (lots of windows, northern surfaces and crack loss) is not ideal, or if the frost line is deeper than the footings.....you can lose heat almost as fast as you put it in. So you have two electric motors running at 85% when the temp gets cloze to freezing or below. It's expensive. Far more expensive than turning on the gas furnace at 35°F and running only the gas and one circulation fan.

In the case of too large of a heat pump. Again, it has two larger electric motors running anytime it runs. While it runs less than one that is too small, if you also have the same common heat loss issues.....it still runs too long and costs more than you want to pay.

I found it odd when I moved back here that houses of the era that my mom and dad's house were built in (1999)....all of them around here from what the HVAC guy said....have this set up.
One heat pump for each floor and a gas furnace for each floor......I lived in Oklahoma for all of high school and college.....and virtually none of the houses from the late 70s through the 80s were built this way. They all had heat pumps. They all worked. Some had gas furnaces but many did not.

The hvac guy pointed out....that for square miles around our neighborhood.....you are not likely to find many....if any...houses below 2800 to 3000 square feet with stupid huge Balloon roofs, big attics (an ugly style from the late 90s to mid 2000's)....and far too many HUGE windows no matter whether they are double or triple pane or not.

It's probably not so much that heat pumps are not quite as efficient in every locale as they should be....it's also that they are being pushed past their calculated limits. You also see this in the fact that it's common that a heat pump anymore does not last much past 7-10 years.

Ray

Tue Mar 04, 2025 12:10 pm

We may run out of electricity before we run out of gasoline.

All the push for electric for homes, cars, trucks, AI servers, Meanwhile electric plants closing, while replacement plants are at best expensive and part time.. solar panels or windmills. It is a crazy world.

Tue Mar 04, 2025 12:26 pm

zerotofifty wrote: We may run out of electricity before we run out of gasoline.

All the push for electric for homes, cars, trucks, AI servers, Meanwhile electric plants closing, while replacement plants are at best expensive and part time.. solar panels or windmills. It is a crazy world.

Come to Texas home of the greatest EV - Tesla. We have plenty of electricity and gasoline.

The electric plants closing are because of the government. We've had to deal with them closing our excellent coal plants. Lots of coal in the ground to be dug up and burned. China has 1,161 coal plants and is still building them. We need to be more competitive.

Tue Mar 04, 2025 1:04 pm

heimlich wrote: zerotofifty wrote: We may run out of electricity before we run out of gasoline.

All the push for electric for homes, cars, trucks, AI servers, Meanwhile electric plants closing, while replacement plants are at best expensive and part time.. solar panels or windmills. It is a crazy world.

Come to Texas home of the greatest EV - Tesla. We have plenty of electricity and gasoline.

The electric plants closing are because of the government. We've had to deal with them closing our excellent coal plants. Lots of coal in the ground to be dug up and burned. China has 1,161 coal plants and is still building them. We need to be more competitive.

Texas is the largest installer of solar electricity in the USA. Why dig up coal and deal with ash when the sun shines for free? Solar and wind generation, with backup storage, is becoming less expensive.

Tue Mar 04, 2025 2:09 pm

One word: Reliability.

I've never seen any ash. I lived a mile from a coal plant.

We have a lot of wind here too.

Gas, shale gas, is my favorite. It provides really good energy. I want a shale gas powered car but that never came to fruition from the 90's. Now we have wind and solar. I wonder if it will die the same government mandated death.

I think the next wave will be home systems where we don't need the grid anymore. I see a lot of this in Europe. They made the electricity so unreliable and expensive there.