this post was submitted on 14 Apr 2024
134 points (98.6% liked)
Climate - truthful information about climate, related activism and politics.
5197 readers
896 users here now
Discussion of climate, how it is changing, activism around that, the politics, and the energy systems change we need in order to stabilize things.
As a starting point, the burning of fossil fuels, and to a lesser extent deforestation and release of methane are responsible for the warming in recent decades:
How much each change to the atmosphere has warmed the world:
Recommended actions to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the near future:
Anti-science, inactivism, and unsupported conspiracy theories are not ok here.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
The article is about NYC where buildings are all much older than 50 years. But for the rest of the country? Everyone has known that heat pumps are more efficient for decades which is why they are standard for all new installs. Unless you live in northern Canada, they save money which is why everyone chooses them. Of course there is backup heat for extreme cold which is why it's always hybrid heatpump with electric or glass backup.
Smart thermostats are what make them really good. In climates where it gets really cold, you need to have a way to switch over from pumping cold air to pumping hot air to using a secondary heat source.
It wouldn't have to be that smart, or even networked. A z80 or 8008 processor would have been plenty. High end systems could have done it in the 70s, with costs coming down quickly through the 80s.
That's standard for all whole house heat pumps and has been for forever. ( as opposed to the mini split heatpumps where it's a heatpump for one room in a house).