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Everyone is worked up about losing their gas stove, but natural gas heating is far more reliable and efficient than any electric option right now. This will cre

Everyone is worked up about losing their gas stove, but natural gas heating is far more reliable and efficient than any electric option right now. This will create a lot of issues until heat pumps catch up. Northern New York is very cold.

tombert 3y ago
Can't modern heat pumps work even in crazy cold climates now? I seem to remember seeing that some are rated for -20F nowadays.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- stathibus 3y ago
  Some are, and some of those even live up to their temperature rating, but they are subject to wind chill and can also fail due to ice and snow build-up, so its not as good as it sounds.
  - tamaharbor 3y ago
    What is the backup, resistance heating?
    - john_shafthair 3y ago
      Electric resistance heat is super inefficient. That's why it's often referred to as "emergency heat". Ironically the best combo is a heat pump + natural gas furnace as a backup. Best of both worlds. But here we are making those illegal so we can pretend to save the planet.
      - CydeWeys 3y ago
        > Ironically the best combo is a heat pump + natural gas furnace as a backup. Best of both worlds. But here we are making those illegal so we can pretend to save the planet. How does this work in practice though? The natural gas distribution lines don't pay for themselves. If they're only gonna be used in emergencies then they'll be crazy expensive. You have a lot of money by not having to run natural gas through a neighborhood at all. A more realistic backup in these types of places (which is used widely in the northeast) is heating fuel oil in a tank.
        john_shafthair 3y ago
        I agree with everything you said except there has been a war on heating oil since before this tiff with natural gas. So even suggesting that is anathema because it would be career suicide for the politicians pushing this. You can certainly use an oil furnace as a second stage, though oil is more often used as a boiler for steam or hydronic.
        simfree 3y ago
        Storing heating oil is risky, expensive and is a dirty use of a property due to the need for an underground or above ground tank. Abatement of tank leaks can run into the millions as you have to dig up all soil contaminated by heating oil when the tank is retired, and tank retirement is a cost that holds up many property sales and redevelopment here in the Pacific Northwest.
        john_shafthair 3y ago
        That's not really true elsewhere. Using in-ground oil tanks is an antiquated practice that isn't used anymore. Any modern heating oil installation has the tanks either in the cellar or in the yard behind the house. Either one would immediately reveal a leak so it could be remedied quickly. Yes Seattle is full of shitty bungalows with in-ground oil tanks that have to be condemned, it is a problem and one of the many reasons Seattle sucks. I did a stint at AWS so know the area. You can get away with a heat pump or baseboard electric in Seattle because the outdoor temperature rarely dips below 30F in winter. Go to a place like Maine where the vast majority of houses use oil. There is no natural gas infrastructure and heating with electric is impractical. 30F is a 'warm' winter day. A heat pump cannot effectively deal with the frigid climate in the NE and electric space heating would be insanely expensive. Many thousands of homes are heating with oil in the northeast everyday and not turning their yards into superfund sites. There are many compromises that work for the milquetoast PNW that won't work elsewhere.
        8note 3y ago
        Without said "war on heating oil" suddenly it becomes cheap to install multiple heating systems in your house? What changes with it not being political suicide? Government subsidies paying to add oil infrastructure to houses and to pay for unused pipelines?
      - ryukafalz 3y ago
        > Electric resistance heat is super inefficient. That's why it's often referred to as "emergency heat". Yes, which is why it only kicks in when the heat pump isn't enough. Which is not most of the year!
        rayiner 3y ago
        The problem is when it kicks in for everyone in the neighborhood at the same time on an especially cold night and causes a brown out. (Happened to me this winter.)
      - osigurdson 3y ago
        >> Electric resistance heat is super inefficient I know what you mean but it is actually nearly 100% efficient. The inefficient part is converting high entropy heat to low entropy electricity.
        GeneralMayhem 3y ago
        Heat pumps are significantly >100% efficient, if measured as (heat energy brought inside)/(electrical energy consumed).
        osigurdson 3y ago
        Yes, because you are moving heat from one location to another. Same thing with a refrigerator.
      - 8note 3y ago
        If you actually had to pay for the methane leakage from having the interconnect, it would be cost prohibitive, even if they were legal.
- john_shafthair 3y ago
  Not when the power's out for days - as often happens in winter storms. You can run the blower and electronics of a natural gas furnace or boiler off a little camping generator for a week or even better a natural gas whole house unit in perpetuity. So you don't, you know, freeze to death.
  - smileysteve 3y ago
    If you take the investment that is the infrastructure for gas lines (all underground) and do similar for most electricity then storms don't take out electricity and people don't die. Best of all, the total investment and maintenance actually decreases.
    - tomohawk 3y ago
      How about you get that done first, prove that its at least as reliable, and then start banning things?
      - greenthrow 3y ago
        Other countries have buried their power lines ages ago, and yes it is as reliable as gas, more so.
    - nonethewiser 3y ago
      But gas lines are already down. If it were as easy as you said then NY would already have no grid problems.
  - JamisonM 3y ago
    "You can run the blower and electronics of a natural gas furnace or boiler off a little camping generator.." Likewise for a heat pump, right? Does this "power out for days after a winter storm" thing actually happen very often? I am from Manitoba and my worst-ever experience was 10-11 hours when it was very, very cold out in 35+ years.
    - 3y ago
- reisse 3y ago
  I lived in a building with heat pumps in Europe. In colder climate, they're loud. As in, LOUD. It's likely fine when you can install the external module somewhere on the roof (poor birds though), but in many apartment buildings you can only put it on the outer walls, and you can clearly hear the sound inside the flat. Internal modules that cycle air are also noisy, though less. I'm glad to pay the premium for silent heating.
  - Maximus9000 3y ago
    There are quiet heat pumps available: https://homeinspectioninsider.com/are-all-heat-pumps-noisy-11-quietest-heat-pumps-reviewed/ https://homeinspectioninsider.com/are-all-heat-pumps-noisy-1...
  - maccard 3y ago
    I'd hardly classify my gas boiler as silent.
  - 8note 3y ago
    Americans already have heat pumps installed "air conditioning units" Burning stuff is also loud, but resistive heating is mostly quiet other than fan noise and metal containers creaking as they heat up/cool down
- cwillu 3y ago
  My city was only a couple degrees short of -40 this last winter.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
rgmerk 3y ago
Yes, but the vast majority of the population of New York State lives in places where air source heat pumps work just fine. Air source heat pumps can be built to work down to at least -20 Fahrenheit[1]. That's equal to the coldest temperature on record in places like Buffalo and Albany. For those relatively few people living in places which get even colder than that, there's the option of either ground loop heat pumps, or more pragmatically propane burners for the very few nights of the year that are super-cold. [1] https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/rheem-heat-pump-surpasses-the-us-department-of-energys-cold-climate-heat-pump-technology-challenge-301796122.html https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/rheem-heat-pump-sur...
- its-summertime 3y ago
  But is it more efficient overall? Gas to elec, infrastructure losses, etc. vs just gas to heat?
  - scatters 3y ago
    Sure. A heat pump only needs to be 170% efficient to make back the generation losses. As for infrastructure losses, natural gas distribution has leaks as well. Also, if the power plant is integrated into a CHP system to heat nearby households then generation gets back some percent.
    - rgmerk 3y ago
      Good point. Methane leaks are much more environmentally damaging than often appreciated because methane is such a potent greenhouse gas.
  - jasonwatkinspdx 3y ago
    Heat pumps are dramatically more efficient. A good gas furnace is 95% efficient. Meanwhile, a ductless heat pump can be 300%. They more more energy than they consume. That's the huge advantage. Converting gas heat to heat pumps, even if they have a gas heat backup for worst case days in northern latitudes, would still be a big win in the net environmentally.
greenthrow 3y ago
This is completely false. Gas heating is way, way less efficient than a heat pump. And don't bring up low temperatures, modern heat pumps can have back up resistive heaters and combined use will still be far, far more efficient than gas heat. If you can install geothermal that's better still. Stop spreading fossil fuel industry lies.
- r00fus 3y ago
  At very low temperatures? I think if you're above zero F, you should be ok, but below zero it gets expensive. They're not talking about taxing gas - they're talking about banning it.
  - greenthrow 3y ago
    > At very low temperatures? I think if you're above zero F, you should be ok, but below zero it gets expensive. Did you read my comment before replying? I already addressed this. Yes I am talking about well below zero F. > They're not talking about taxing gas - they're talking about banning it. Yes and they should ban it. Electric heating is way more efficient, doesn't poison the occupants and can be powered from renwable sources.
    - r00fus 3y ago
      Sure, in CA a ban makes sense (though Berkeley law was overturned). But in a polar vortex winter storm, how do you have enough power to keep the building warm if there's no power, and the minimal reserves you may have with battery backup are not enough to run the heat pump? I think this ban is too bold and will result in political backlash that will end up doing worse than if something less drastic was proposed. Hochul was 10pts away from losing the last race to a complete RW zealot.
- missedthecue 3y ago
  I wouldn't say it's "completely false", it depends on the temperature. Heat pump efficiency drops as the temperature drops. If you live in a place with very cold temperatures for prolonged periods of time, gas may indeed be more efficient.
rcme 3y ago
Heat Pumps can run in very cold temperatures, but it's just not worth it, economically, because their efficiency drops and gas becomes a cheaper option.
- binarycrusader 3y ago
  It is not always a cheaper option. Especially, if for example, you don’t have natural gas service at all currently. In some areas of Seattle there is no natural gas service and so homes may be all electric if newer, or if older may only have oil heating. Also, I know you likely didn’t mean to exclude this, but in cases where gas service might be cheaper in the short term that’s only because it’s effectively heavily subsidized and many of the costs are externalized.
- feedsmgmt 3y ago
  In almost all of the continental USA the number of days that cold are more than offset by the savings during the rest of the days of the year. This YouTube channel covers the topic extensively https://youtu.be/MFEHFsO-XSI https://youtu.be/MFEHFsO-XSI
jillesvangurp 3y ago
Heat pumps are about 250-300% efficient. Relative to resistive heating which is of course 100% efficient. Gas is about close to 100% (you loose some via exhaust). Ground source heat pumps work pretty much anywhere. Air source heat pumps can be more challenging but can also work at more extreme temperatures. They don't stop working but their efficiency drops a bit. And of course resistive heating doesn't stop working. Heat pumps are used all over Scandinavia and well into the arctic circle, including rural areas in the parts of Scandinavia (i.e. the polar circle) that see extreme temperatures far more regularly and for far longer periods than NY. Of course relative to NY, they do have a more reliable power grid and excellent building standards. Triple (not double) glazing is the norm there, for example. And of course more rural places would also feature wood stoves as a backup. There is mostly no gas network there; especially not in rural areas. Before heat pumps became popular about thirty years ago they would have used that or oil based systems.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- nucleardog 3y ago
  > And of course resistive heating doesn't stop working. Well except… > Of course relative to NY, they do have a more reliable power grid Okay, yeah. That would pretty much be my concern. Having been without power for over two weeks in the past 12 months the propane tanks and propane stove / furnace / water heater have been a lifesaver. Powering the control boards / fans with a generator (or even UPS in a pinch) is a lot simpler proposition than trying to generate enough power to heat my house, water, and food with resistive heating.
  - UncleMeat 3y ago
    Gas furnaces don't work without power by default. The fan that pushes the hot air through your house won't work. Many gas furnaces have electrically powered safety features that won't allow the furnace to function if the power is out.
    - 3y ago
8note 3y ago
The 100% efficiency for the worst case electric heating is still 100% efficiency. Burning gas is inherently more complex to transfer heat, and has more losses as a result.
nonethewiser 3y ago
> Northern New York is very cold. Lots of houses burn oil in NY. That will still be possible.

tombert 3y ago

Can't modern heat pumps work even in crazy cold climates now? I seem to remember seeing that some are rated for -20F nowadays.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
stathibus 3y ago
Some are, and some of those even live up to their temperature rating, but they are subject to wind chill and can also fail due to ice and snow build-up, so its not as good as it sounds.
- tamaharbor 3y ago
  What is the backup, resistance heating?
  - john_shafthair 3y ago
    Electric resistance heat is super inefficient. That's why it's often referred to as "emergency heat". Ironically the best combo is a heat pump + natural gas furnace as a backup. Best of both worlds. But here we are making those illegal so we can pretend to save the planet.
    - CydeWeys 3y ago
      > Ironically the best combo is a heat pump + natural gas furnace as a backup. Best of both worlds. But here we are making those illegal so we can pretend to save the planet. How does this work in practice though? The natural gas distribution lines don't pay for themselves. If they're only gonna be used in emergencies then they'll be crazy expensive. You have a lot of money by not having to run natural gas through a neighborhood at all. A more realistic backup in these types of places (which is used widely in the northeast) is heating fuel oil in a tank.
      - john_shafthair 3y ago
        I agree with everything you said except there has been a war on heating oil since before this tiff with natural gas. So even suggesting that is anathema because it would be career suicide for the politicians pushing this. You can certainly use an oil furnace as a second stage, though oil is more often used as a boiler for steam or hydronic.
        simfree 3y ago
        Storing heating oil is risky, expensive and is a dirty use of a property due to the need for an underground or above ground tank. Abatement of tank leaks can run into the millions as you have to dig up all soil contaminated by heating oil when the tank is retired, and tank retirement is a cost that holds up many property sales and redevelopment here in the Pacific Northwest.
        john_shafthair 3y ago
        That's not really true elsewhere. Using in-ground oil tanks is an antiquated practice that isn't used anymore. Any modern heating oil installation has the tanks either in the cellar or in the yard behind the house. Either one would immediately reveal a leak so it could be remedied quickly. Yes Seattle is full of shitty bungalows with in-ground oil tanks that have to be condemned, it is a problem and one of the many reasons Seattle sucks. I did a stint at AWS so know the area. You can get away with a heat pump or baseboard electric in Seattle because the outdoor temperature rarely dips below 30F in winter. Go to a place like Maine where the vast majority of houses use oil. There is no natural gas infrastructure and heating with electric is impractical. 30F is a 'warm' winter day. A heat pump cannot effectively deal with the frigid climate in the NE and electric space heating would be insanely expensive. Many thousands of homes are heating with oil in the northeast everyday and not turning their yards into superfund sites. There are many compromises that work for the milquetoast PNW that won't work elsewhere.
        8note 3y ago
        Without said "war on heating oil" suddenly it becomes cheap to install multiple heating systems in your house? What changes with it not being political suicide? Government subsidies paying to add oil infrastructure to houses and to pay for unused pipelines?
    - ryukafalz 3y ago
      > Electric resistance heat is super inefficient. That's why it's often referred to as "emergency heat". Yes, which is why it only kicks in when the heat pump isn't enough. Which is not most of the year!
      - rayiner 3y ago
        The problem is when it kicks in for everyone in the neighborhood at the same time on an especially cold night and causes a brown out. (Happened to me this winter.)
    - osigurdson 3y ago
      >> Electric resistance heat is super inefficient I know what you mean but it is actually nearly 100% efficient. The inefficient part is converting high entropy heat to low entropy electricity.
      - GeneralMayhem 3y ago
        Heat pumps are significantly >100% efficient, if measured as (heat energy brought inside)/(electrical energy consumed).
        osigurdson 3y ago
        Yes, because you are moving heat from one location to another. Same thing with a refrigerator.
    - 8note 3y ago
      If you actually had to pay for the methane leakage from having the interconnect, it would be cost prohibitive, even if they were legal.
john_shafthair 3y ago
Not when the power's out for days - as often happens in winter storms. You can run the blower and electronics of a natural gas furnace or boiler off a little camping generator for a week or even better a natural gas whole house unit in perpetuity. So you don't, you know, freeze to death.
- smileysteve 3y ago
  If you take the investment that is the infrastructure for gas lines (all underground) and do similar for most electricity then storms don't take out electricity and people don't die. Best of all, the total investment and maintenance actually decreases.
  - tomohawk 3y ago
    How about you get that done first, prove that its at least as reliable, and then start banning things?
    - greenthrow 3y ago
      Other countries have buried their power lines ages ago, and yes it is as reliable as gas, more so.
  - nonethewiser 3y ago
    But gas lines are already down. If it were as easy as you said then NY would already have no grid problems.
- JamisonM 3y ago
  "You can run the blower and electronics of a natural gas furnace or boiler off a little camping generator.." Likewise for a heat pump, right? Does this "power out for days after a winter storm" thing actually happen very often? I am from Manitoba and my worst-ever experience was 10-11 hours when it was very, very cold out in 35+ years.
  - 3y ago
reisse 3y ago
I lived in a building with heat pumps in Europe. In colder climate, they're loud. As in, LOUD. It's likely fine when you can install the external module somewhere on the roof (poor birds though), but in many apartment buildings you can only put it on the outer walls, and you can clearly hear the sound inside the flat. Internal modules that cycle air are also noisy, though less. I'm glad to pay the premium for silent heating.
- Maximus9000 3y ago
  There are quiet heat pumps available: https://homeinspectioninsider.com/are-all-heat-pumps-noisy-11-quietest-heat-pumps-reviewed/ https://homeinspectioninsider.com/are-all-heat-pumps-noisy-1...
- maccard 3y ago
  I'd hardly classify my gas boiler as silent.
- 8note 3y ago
  Americans already have heat pumps installed "air conditioning units" Burning stuff is also loud, but resistive heating is mostly quiet other than fan noise and metal containers creaking as they heat up/cool down
cwillu 3y ago
My city was only a couple degrees short of -40 this last winter.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

rgmerk 3y ago

Yes, but the vast majority of the population of New York State lives in places where air source heat pumps work just fine. Air source heat pumps can be built to work down to at least -20 Fahrenheit[1]. That's equal to the coldest temperature on record in places like Buffalo and Albany. For those relatively few people living in places which get even colder than that, there's the option of either ground loop heat pumps, or more pragmatically propane burners for the very few nights of the year that are super-cold. [1] https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/rheem-heat-pump-surpasses-the-us-department-of-energys-cold-climate-heat-pump-technology-challenge-301796122.html https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/rheem-heat-pump-sur...

its-summertime 3y ago
But is it more efficient overall? Gas to elec, infrastructure losses, etc. vs just gas to heat?
- scatters 3y ago
  Sure. A heat pump only needs to be 170% efficient to make back the generation losses. As for infrastructure losses, natural gas distribution has leaks as well. Also, if the power plant is integrated into a CHP system to heat nearby households then generation gets back some percent.
  - rgmerk 3y ago
    Good point. Methane leaks are much more environmentally damaging than often appreciated because methane is such a potent greenhouse gas.
- jasonwatkinspdx 3y ago
  Heat pumps are dramatically more efficient. A good gas furnace is 95% efficient. Meanwhile, a ductless heat pump can be 300%. They more more energy than they consume. That's the huge advantage. Converting gas heat to heat pumps, even if they have a gas heat backup for worst case days in northern latitudes, would still be a big win in the net environmentally.

greenthrow 3y ago

This is completely false. Gas heating is way, way less efficient than a heat pump. And don't bring up low temperatures, modern heat pumps can have back up resistive heaters and combined use will still be far, far more efficient than gas heat. If you can install geothermal that's better still. Stop spreading fossil fuel industry lies.

r00fus 3y ago
At very low temperatures? I think if you're above zero F, you should be ok, but below zero it gets expensive. They're not talking about taxing gas - they're talking about banning it.
- greenthrow 3y ago
  > At very low temperatures? I think if you're above zero F, you should be ok, but below zero it gets expensive. Did you read my comment before replying? I already addressed this. Yes I am talking about well below zero F. > They're not talking about taxing gas - they're talking about banning it. Yes and they should ban it. Electric heating is way more efficient, doesn't poison the occupants and can be powered from renwable sources.
  - r00fus 3y ago
    Sure, in CA a ban makes sense (though Berkeley law was overturned). But in a polar vortex winter storm, how do you have enough power to keep the building warm if there's no power, and the minimal reserves you may have with battery backup are not enough to run the heat pump? I think this ban is too bold and will result in political backlash that will end up doing worse than if something less drastic was proposed. Hochul was 10pts away from losing the last race to a complete RW zealot.
missedthecue 3y ago
I wouldn't say it's "completely false", it depends on the temperature. Heat pump efficiency drops as the temperature drops. If you live in a place with very cold temperatures for prolonged periods of time, gas may indeed be more efficient.

rcme 3y ago

Heat Pumps can run in very cold temperatures, but it's just not worth it, economically, because their efficiency drops and gas becomes a cheaper option.

binarycrusader 3y ago
It is not always a cheaper option. Especially, if for example, you don’t have natural gas service at all currently. In some areas of Seattle there is no natural gas service and so homes may be all electric if newer, or if older may only have oil heating. Also, I know you likely didn’t mean to exclude this, but in cases where gas service might be cheaper in the short term that’s only because it’s effectively heavily subsidized and many of the costs are externalized.
feedsmgmt 3y ago
In almost all of the continental USA the number of days that cold are more than offset by the savings during the rest of the days of the year. This YouTube channel covers the topic extensively https://youtu.be/MFEHFsO-XSI https://youtu.be/MFEHFsO-XSI

jillesvangurp 3y ago

Heat pumps are about 250-300% efficient. Relative to resistive heating which is of course 100% efficient. Gas is about close to 100% (you loose some via exhaust). Ground source heat pumps work pretty much anywhere. Air source heat pumps can be more challenging but can also work at more extreme temperatures. They don't stop working but their efficiency drops a bit. And of course resistive heating doesn't stop working. Heat pumps are used all over Scandinavia and well into the arctic circle, including rural areas in the parts of Scandinavia (i.e. the polar circle) that see extreme temperatures far more regularly and for far longer periods than NY. Of course relative to NY, they do have a more reliable power grid and excellent building standards. Triple (not double) glazing is the norm there, for example. And of course more rural places would also feature wood stoves as a backup. There is mostly no gas network there; especially not in rural areas. Before heat pumps became popular about thirty years ago they would have used that or oil based systems.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
nucleardog 3y ago
> And of course resistive heating doesn't stop working. Well except… > Of course relative to NY, they do have a more reliable power grid Okay, yeah. That would pretty much be my concern. Having been without power for over two weeks in the past 12 months the propane tanks and propane stove / furnace / water heater have been a lifesaver. Powering the control boards / fans with a generator (or even UPS in a pinch) is a lot simpler proposition than trying to generate enough power to heat my house, water, and food with resistive heating.
- UncleMeat 3y ago
  Gas furnaces don't work without power by default. The fan that pushes the hot air through your house won't work. Many gas furnaces have electrically powered safety features that won't allow the furnace to function if the power is out.
  - 3y ago

8note 3y ago

The 100% efficiency for the worst case electric heating is still 100% efficiency. Burning gas is inherently more complex to transfer heat, and has more losses as a result.

nonethewiser 3y ago

> Northern New York is very cold. Lots of houses burn oil in NY. That will still be possible.