5 ms·

Not an issue. As someone who works on this issues with the very policymakers you are referencing, oh they HAVE considered this. In fact, this is among the reas

by a1371 4y ago

Not an issue. As someone who works on this issues with the very policymakers you are referencing, oh they HAVE considered this. In fact, this is among the reasons that the switch to heat pumps is delayed. Heat pumps can have back up electric heating elements to provide the heating in the extremes. You get a more resilient system than gas. If you have an oil based system, that's worse. There is no good reason to have an oil furnace nowadays.

colatkinson 4y ago
> Heat pumps can have back up electric heating elements to provide the heating in the extremes. You get a more resilient system than gas. Sorry if I'm misunderstanding, but wouldn't the backup electric heating elements require, well, electricity to function? I'm no fan of gas, but the idea of losing heating, phone service (the old copper wire systems could function even in a blackout), the ability to cook (since gas stoves are being phased out), and the ability to travel (EVs and some trains) because a transformer exploded is kinda scary. Like, we're putting all our faith in a system that is routinely knocked out by errant tree branches. Maybe we could do buried lines, but given infra costs in the US that sounds... expensive. Someone in another thread mentioned heat reservoirs of some kind, but I have no idea how realistic that is. Even if it buys a few extra hours, that'd improve things dramatically. From the sound of it, you're far more familiar with specific legislation than I, so maybe I'm totally off and all this has been taken into account. But having experienced an extended blackout and my family realizing we couldn't even boil water, I'm apprehensive to say the least. IMO it'd be nice to move away from fossil fuels without betting lives on ConEd doing repairs in a timely fashion.
- antisthenes 4y ago
  The OP was trying to suggest that at some point the temperatures drop to the point where the heat pump is less than 100% efficient, whereas a backup resistive electric heating element is always 100% efficient. The problem with that is..like you mentioned, it still uses electricity.
- rightbyte 4y ago
  > we're putting all our faith in a system that is routinely knocked out by errant tree branches. Ye ... one would have thought that JIT delivery would have gone out of fashion after Covid messed everything up. With e.g. wood pellet heating the energy is stored in your home already. No amount of tree branches falling in the wrong places will make you freeze to ice.
  - pasttense01 4y ago
    "Do pellet stoves use a lot of electricity? They also require electricity to run fans, controls, and pellet feeders. Under normal usage, they consume about 100 kilowatt-hours (kWh) or about $9 worth of electricity per month. Unless the stove has a back-up power supply, the loss of electric power results in no heat and possibly some smoke in the house." https://www.energy.gov/energysaver/wood-and-pellet-heating https://www.energy.gov/energysaver/wood-and-pellet-heating In other words the same situation as when you have a natural gas furnace: the electricity goes out and your furnace no longer operates.
    - rightbyte 4y ago
      Sure. But you can put pellets in a cage and burn them manually in fire stoves. A pellets heated water system will need power to circulate the water so that won't work. The gasoline power generator needed to power a pellets furnace is way smaller than for a heat pump system. Like 200W vs 10kW. I meant more inline with "you got the energy in your house already".
    - tomohawk 4y ago
      We have a dual fuel heat pump / oil furnace set up. The heat pump is ok above freezing, but you can see the efficiency drop off starting at 40F. Friday night, we had a several hour power outage as the temps dropped to 10F. So, fired up the diesel generator (runs off the same fuel as the oil furnace) and had no problem heating the house. Our neighbors with their heat pumps spent a very chilly and uncomfortable night, which could have turned deadly had the power not been restored when it was. Heat pumps require a considerably larger and more expensive generator, well outside of the reach of most people to buy and keep in good service. Wood, gas, and oil are all much better than heat pumps in this regard, as even a solar battery can provide enough power so you can survive events like these. Heat pump are good on average, but have really bad failure modes in this regard.
pcdoodle 4y ago
I'm not sure you understand. The required energy is around 4X the baseline. Most smaller homes could heat on a 220V 20A circuit until it get's very cold (-5f or more), at this point you're up to almost 80A @ 220VAC additional resistive heating load per home.
- tzs 4y ago
  You wouldn't use resistance heating at -5℉ with a reasonably modern heat pump, such as Mitsubishi or Fujitsu models designed for cold climates. The Mitsubishi ones don't become less efficient than resistive heating until the temperature drops below -15℉. They are 200% efficiency at 0℉ and 300% at 32℉. Their capacity drops from 100% at 23℉ to 76% at -13℉ so you would want to go with a slightly bigger system than you would in a place that doesn't get so cold.
  - pcdoodle 4y ago
    Thanks for adding more info to my "back of napkin" comment. Heat pumps are fantastic where they make sense, it's -5f here and my 24,000 btu unit is keeping up in 1,000sq ft (DC Inverter Type).
Brian_K_White 4y ago
There are pros and cons to oil, and there are certainly reasons to use it even if they don't happen to apply to you. Oil can't explode. Oil can be carried in as low tech as a pail and stored in an equally low tech tank (where a gas pipe doesn't exist or could fail, where a propane bottle requires a lot more infrastructure). And these are valuable even in developed areas with gas pipes, because it's always valuable to have that flexability to scrounge up milk jugs and drive them in your car, or a bike, when things aren't all perfect. Just on principle even if you never have to do it. Similarly, there are reasons why the best way to distribute the heat around the building is actually not any form of hot water or air but ancient steam. I still look forward to outfitting a house with a fancy buried ground glycol loop heat pump and in-floor water, not oil fired steam, but that's because I can afford to be impractical and I don't kid myself that it's anything else.
sieabahlpark 4y ago
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by a1371 4y ago

colatkinson 4y ago

> Heat pumps can have back up electric heating elements to provide the heating in the extremes. You get a more resilient system than gas. Sorry if I'm misunderstanding, but wouldn't the backup electric heating elements require, well, electricity to function? I'm no fan of gas, but the idea of losing heating, phone service (the old copper wire systems could function even in a blackout), the ability to cook (since gas stoves are being phased out), and the ability to travel (EVs and some trains) because a transformer exploded is kinda scary. Like, we're putting all our faith in a system that is routinely knocked out by errant tree branches. Maybe we could do buried lines, but given infra costs in the US that sounds... expensive. Someone in another thread mentioned heat reservoirs of some kind, but I have no idea how realistic that is. Even if it buys a few extra hours, that'd improve things dramatically. From the sound of it, you're far more familiar with specific legislation than I, so maybe I'm totally off and all this has been taken into account. But having experienced an extended blackout and my family realizing we couldn't even boil water, I'm apprehensive to say the least. IMO it'd be nice to move away from fossil fuels without betting lives on ConEd doing repairs in a timely fashion.

antisthenes 4y ago
The OP was trying to suggest that at some point the temperatures drop to the point where the heat pump is less than 100% efficient, whereas a backup resistive electric heating element is always 100% efficient. The problem with that is..like you mentioned, it still uses electricity.
rightbyte 4y ago
> we're putting all our faith in a system that is routinely knocked out by errant tree branches. Ye ... one would have thought that JIT delivery would have gone out of fashion after Covid messed everything up. With e.g. wood pellet heating the energy is stored in your home already. No amount of tree branches falling in the wrong places will make you freeze to ice.
- pasttense01 4y ago
  "Do pellet stoves use a lot of electricity? They also require electricity to run fans, controls, and pellet feeders. Under normal usage, they consume about 100 kilowatt-hours (kWh) or about $9 worth of electricity per month. Unless the stove has a back-up power supply, the loss of electric power results in no heat and possibly some smoke in the house." https://www.energy.gov/energysaver/wood-and-pellet-heating https://www.energy.gov/energysaver/wood-and-pellet-heating In other words the same situation as when you have a natural gas furnace: the electricity goes out and your furnace no longer operates.
  - rightbyte 4y ago
    Sure. But you can put pellets in a cage and burn them manually in fire stoves. A pellets heated water system will need power to circulate the water so that won't work. The gasoline power generator needed to power a pellets furnace is way smaller than for a heat pump system. Like 200W vs 10kW. I meant more inline with "you got the energy in your house already".
  - tomohawk 4y ago
    We have a dual fuel heat pump / oil furnace set up. The heat pump is ok above freezing, but you can see the efficiency drop off starting at 40F. Friday night, we had a several hour power outage as the temps dropped to 10F. So, fired up the diesel generator (runs off the same fuel as the oil furnace) and had no problem heating the house. Our neighbors with their heat pumps spent a very chilly and uncomfortable night, which could have turned deadly had the power not been restored when it was. Heat pumps require a considerably larger and more expensive generator, well outside of the reach of most people to buy and keep in good service. Wood, gas, and oil are all much better than heat pumps in this regard, as even a solar battery can provide enough power so you can survive events like these. Heat pump are good on average, but have really bad failure modes in this regard.

pcdoodle 4y ago

I'm not sure you understand. The required energy is around 4X the baseline. Most smaller homes could heat on a 220V 20A circuit until it get's very cold (-5f or more), at this point you're up to almost 80A @ 220VAC additional resistive heating load per home.

tzs 4y ago
You wouldn't use resistance heating at -5℉ with a reasonably modern heat pump, such as Mitsubishi or Fujitsu models designed for cold climates. The Mitsubishi ones don't become less efficient than resistive heating until the temperature drops below -15℉. They are 200% efficiency at 0℉ and 300% at 32℉. Their capacity drops from 100% at 23℉ to 76% at -13℉ so you would want to go with a slightly bigger system than you would in a place that doesn't get so cold.
- pcdoodle 4y ago
  Thanks for adding more info to my "back of napkin" comment. Heat pumps are fantastic where they make sense, it's -5f here and my 24,000 btu unit is keeping up in 1,000sq ft (DC Inverter Type).

Brian_K_White 4y ago

There are pros and cons to oil, and there are certainly reasons to use it even if they don't happen to apply to you. Oil can't explode. Oil can be carried in as low tech as a pail and stored in an equally low tech tank (where a gas pipe doesn't exist or could fail, where a propane bottle requires a lot more infrastructure). And these are valuable even in developed areas with gas pipes, because it's always valuable to have that flexability to scrounge up milk jugs and drive them in your car, or a bike, when things aren't all perfect. Just on principle even if you never have to do it. Similarly, there are reasons why the best way to distribute the heat around the building is actually not any form of hot water or air but ancient steam. I still look forward to outfitting a house with a fancy buried ground glycol loop heat pump and in-floor water, not oil fired steam, but that's because I can afford to be impractical and I don't kid myself that it's anything else.

sieabahlpark 4y ago

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