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> for the 60% of European properties that are old and leaky, their installation must come with extra insulation. Shouldn’t this be fixed no matter the heat sou

> for the 60% of European properties that are old and leaky, their installation must come with extra insulation. Shouldn’t this be fixed no matter the heat source?

bafe 3y ago
I'd also think so. Better insulation should mean lower energy demand for heating (and cooling, but as you might imagine residential AC is almost non-existing in central Europe)
laserdancepony 3y ago
In my experience this has been a source of problems as well. Tacked on insulation tends to keep moisture in, ruining the walls over time.
- c0pium 3y ago
  If you do anything wrong then it can cause problems, sure. Is that what we should base our decisions on?
MaxMatti 3y ago
It's always easier to choose the option that costs less to install but more to use. That's why lots of homes have poorly insulated pipes and lots of people use cheap printers that require expensive ink.
- lazide 3y ago
  Heating with gas doesn’t cost more to use (at least now), and doesn’t require the insulation either. Thermal heat from gas is cheap, even when gas is expensive. Gas has a LOT of btus. Furnaces are also far simpler to make and maintain than heat pumps, which is why they are still so popular. Boilers can go either way.
bhewes 3y ago
Yeah as far as residential building tech rehabs Europe is at least 50 years behind. To go into a use an infrared camera and plug it with insulation is easy. There are also geothermal heat pumps that work fine. Edmond, OK incentives geothermal installs in homes as its lowers the city's peak electricity costs. That said Edmond's average household income is $108k for a 31k households city in one of the cheapest metros in the country so they can afford it.
- morsch 3y ago
  New construction in Germany is insanely well insulated -- by law. But we have a huge existing base of old construction that takes ten times as much energy to heat up or more. You can't just hear all that down, and improving the insulation is expensive, more expensive than just installing a new heating system. Think at least 50k EUR for a small house, five to ten times as much for a typical inner city large, multi tenant building.
jibbit 3y ago
A lot of homes - maybe the majority - it would be easier to knock them down and build them again. There isn’t a huge appetite for that…
0xcde4c3db 3y ago
Yes, but the difference is that it's a requirement for the heat pump because furnaces/boilers are available in higher capacities.

> for the 60% of European properties that are old and leaky, their installation must come with extra insulation. Shouldn’t this be fixed no matter the heat source?

bafe 3y ago

I'd also think so. Better insulation should mean lower energy demand for heating (and cooling, but as you might imagine residential AC is almost non-existing in central Europe)

laserdancepony 3y ago

In my experience this has been a source of problems as well. Tacked on insulation tends to keep moisture in, ruining the walls over time.

c0pium 3y ago
If you do anything wrong then it can cause problems, sure. Is that what we should base our decisions on?

MaxMatti 3y ago

It's always easier to choose the option that costs less to install but more to use. That's why lots of homes have poorly insulated pipes and lots of people use cheap printers that require expensive ink.

lazide 3y ago
Heating with gas doesn’t cost more to use (at least now), and doesn’t require the insulation either. Thermal heat from gas is cheap, even when gas is expensive. Gas has a LOT of btus. Furnaces are also far simpler to make and maintain than heat pumps, which is why they are still so popular. Boilers can go either way.

bhewes 3y ago

Yeah as far as residential building tech rehabs Europe is at least 50 years behind. To go into a use an infrared camera and plug it with insulation is easy. There are also geothermal heat pumps that work fine. Edmond, OK incentives geothermal installs in homes as its lowers the city's peak electricity costs. That said Edmond's average household income is $108k for a 31k households city in one of the cheapest metros in the country so they can afford it.

morsch 3y ago
New construction in Germany is insanely well insulated -- by law. But we have a huge existing base of old construction that takes ten times as much energy to heat up or more. You can't just hear all that down, and improving the insulation is expensive, more expensive than just installing a new heating system. Think at least 50k EUR for a small house, five to ten times as much for a typical inner city large, multi tenant building.

jibbit 3y ago

A lot of homes - maybe the majority - it would be easier to knock them down and build them again. There isn’t a huge appetite for that…

0xcde4c3db 3y ago

Yes, but the difference is that it's a requirement for the heat pump because furnaces/boilers are available in higher capacities.