The Green Transition: The problem with heat pumps
Weekly analysis of the shift towards a new economy.
Dear readers,
Happy Friday from the Spotlight on Policy team. As ever, you can find our coverage on the New Statesman website here.
This is Alona Ferber, The Green Transition’s editor, covering for Jonny Ball, who is thinking about the future of the economy in sunnier climes. He will be back in a few weeks. In the meantime, our sustainability correspondent Megan Kenyon has been pondering heat pumps.
Thank you for reading,
Alona
The problem with heat pumps
My parents are getting the hang of sustainable living. From their home in Cumbria, they drive a hybrid car, which they charge regularly in the garage and last year they had solar panels installed on their roof.
But their adoption of renewable alternatives stops at their central heating. Like 23 million other households in the UK, they still have a gas boiler. A heat pump, which is powered by electricity, either takes heat from the air or the ground and uses it to control the temperature of a building. Unlike a gas boiler, no fossil fuels are directly involved in operating it.
Over Christmas, I tried lobbying Dad to make the switch when my parents’ boiler needs replacing. Perhaps due to my mediocre powers of persuasion he remained hesitant, questioning how well heat pumps work.
As the proud owners of a pair of solar panels, my parents ought to be the ideal customers for a heat pump. The system can work in a closed loop, with the electricity from the panels powering the pump. That should reduce their overall heating costs.
Still, their hesitancy is not unique. A 2022 survey by the sustainable consultancy firm, DG Cities, found that almost half of respondents (46 per cent) only knew “a little” about heat pumps. One in five said they had heard of the systems, but didn’t actually know what they were.
Misinformation about heat pumps – whether they work effectively in cold weather or will reduce a bill payer’s heating costs – is rife. Last week, the Energy Minister, Lord Callanan told Sky News’ ClimateCast that “vested interests” are “funding campaigns of misinformation” about heat pumps.
Given the potential for decarbonisation in switching to heat pumps, the government must do much more to increase their uptake. Last year, Rishi Sunak pushed back the deadline for the phase-out of fossil fuel boilers by ten years to 2035. It is expected a further 10 million gas boilers will be installed before we hit that deadline.
In Sweden, heat pumps are the ubiquitous choice of central heating system and have been used by residents for around 40 years. Daniel Särefjord, the UK chief executive of the Swedish heat pump firm Aira, moved to the UK earlier this year and is currently spending his “first winter with a gas boiler”.
Aira launched in the UK last year, and plans to make use of the government’s £450m Boiler Upgrade Scheme to help consumers transition to pumps. Särefjord tells The Green Transition that Sweden’s shift to heat pumps was sparked by the mid-1970s oil crisis. With the cost of oil at record highs, the Swedish government gave consumers subsidies to swich from fossil fuel heating systems to electrical alternatives.
Särefjord points out that one of the reasons such a widespread transition hasn’t happened in the UK is because it has a “very advanced gas network” which has served the population “really well”. He is hopeful, however, that “change is starting to happen”.
But more change is needed for more of us to opt for heat pumps. Electricity is currently more expensive due to it being subject to carbon taxes. In comparison, natural gas used for residential heating is not taxed and is therefore currently cheaper. This is despite the fact that around half of the UK’s electricity is renewable.
Another barrier to rolling out heat pumps is the planning system. Särefjord says more than half the consumers his company meets require planning permission to install a heat pumps, due to the sound the system makes, and the fact it must be attached to the outside of the property. This is offputting for potential converts and can slow down the process. It is an even bigger block for those whose boilers break down and need to replace their heating system urgently.
With the built environment contributing around 40 per cent of the UK’s total carbon emissions, decarbonising heating systems is essential. And a lot of work evidently needs to be done to convince my parents, and others, to change their gas boiler.
In brief
Green New Deal: Mathew Lawrence of the Common Wealth explains why Labour’s Green Prosperity Plan makes urgent economic sense, no matter what the party's fears over spending commitments and anti-green voters.
No way to net zero: John Gummer, aka Lord Deben, aka the former chair of the UK’s independent Climate Change Commission, tells Megan that Rishi Sunak must change course to reach net zero.
What about the farmers? Ned Hammond from the think tank Onward, urges the next government (whoever they are) to stop the decline of nature by protecting the future of farming. There is is a three-pronged battle, he writes: to help farmers go green, boost their profits, and ensure food is affordable.
Can you make vinyl sustainable? The New Statesman’s Ellen Peirson-Hagger reports from the Netherlands, where the company Deepgrooves has developed a green alternative for LPs.
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Thank you for reading.
Please send any news or comments to: jonathan.ball@newstatesman.co.uk
One immense problem with heat pumps is the cost. Subsidies offered by the government are derisory. People need to pay around as much as they would pay for a replacement boiler in order to motivate them to change. In addition, many homes would need an upgrade to their existing radiators, adding to both cost and upheaval.
Labour's abandon of its commitment to investing in green technologies, underlines the problem with our electoral system with General Elections no more than 5 years apart, where our political parties will usually promise policies that bring benefits to voters within 5 years to help them get re-elected. The core problem is that the UK does not generate sufficient wealth (GDP) to bring-in enough tax revenue to pay for all our demands. With the 2050 deadline to stop the emissions of fossil carbon, the UK must take a longer view than 5 years, so perhaps an agreement of all parties of what needs to done, should be written into law so that it cannot be changed?
Considering the UK's expertise in clean energy technologies, we should give more support to UK industries to manufacture equipment to generate clean energy, rather than leaving it to foreign suppliers to sell it to us, as this would also provide a new opportunity to export the equipment, increasing our GDP which is urgently needed.