Newsday article about high electric bills w/ heat pumps

HydroNiCK

https://www.newsday.com/business/green-homes-heat-pump-pseg-1.50180228

JUGHNE

Looks interesting but can't get rid of the Newsday ad blocking the story.

Steamhead

Try Adblock Plus.

Not the first time I've heard of this. Heat pumps become more expensive to run as the outdoor temperature drops. And, of course, the utilities don't tell this to customers...............

JakeCK

Why are other rate payers subsidizing people with heat pumps? This is asinine. Air source heat pumps are horrible for colder climates. Ground source aka geothermal are a different story tho.

Jamie Hall

Steamhead said:

Try Adblock Plus.

Not the first time I've heard of this. Heat pumps become more expensive to run as the outdoor temperature drops. And, of course, the utilities don't tell this to customers...............

A lot of the salespeople -- I won't call them tradesmen -- neglect to mention it either. Or politicians... (oh, I repeat myself...)

EdTheHeaterMan

Not the first horror story I've heard. Tried to sell an oil-fired boiler to a neighbor, but he went with LP-gas boiler. The propane prices actually made the cost to heat his home increase from that of the 40-year-old boiler that it replaced. He chose a WM CG boiler with a draft hood. The guy across the street from him filled me in a year after I did not get the job.

That neighbor swapped out the 50+year old boiler for an EK oil-fired and cut over 25% on the total annual gallons. Weil Mclain makes a good gas boiler, don't they?

...But you can't please all the people all the time! PT Barnum

Yours truly,
Mr.Ed

Jamie Hall

Don't shoot the messenger, there, @EdTheHeaterMan . It's not so much the Weil-McClain (although odds are its oversized) as it is what he's feeding it... it's really rare for LP to save money.

hot_rod

A 200 year old drafty home and a misapplied HP product...what could go wrong:)

HVACNUT

I read that article a few days ago. He obviously didn't come here for advice first like he should have. 

EdTheHeaterMan

@Jamie Hall I wasn't so much busting on the WM boiler but the fact that the Homeowner used the lowest price "NEW HEATER" he could get ... and by magic his costs would automatically drop. When you have been doing this for (at the time) 25 years, one's experience with promoting the best possible outcome for a customer is often met with apprehension from a consumer. I guess he thought I only wanted to sell him the higher price "NEW HEATER".

I'd rather my competitor be the one who takes the blame for that mistakes.
The Dissatisfaction with the lower price project far outlasts the Joy of that lower price!

Jamie Hall

You are so right, @EdTheHeaterMan !

ethicalpaul

1. Customer never called utility to switch to “electric heating” rate
2. customer somehow thought his old monthly budget payment would continue despite now heating with electricity 
3. the article never did state his oil costs vs his heat pump costs for the year
4. “oil is warmer” lol well ok
5. customer paid through the nose for heat pump system

We all have our biases but honestly come on guys, this story is kind of dumb

TAG

With about 8 switches over the past 30 years .... never had big savings in the switch to propane from oil. Propane eliminates the maintenance/cleaning cost each year ... propane always seems to work out to around .10 electric. So if your heat pump COP can get you under the .10 kw ... you run the HP. Making the math easy .......Oil at $2.25g vs propane at $1.75g is about the match prior to playing with efficiencies. Propane can spike and bite you if your timing is unlucky. One can win in a given year .... I remember some cheap propane years in the mid 00's and horrible ones around 2012. Oil was more back in the later 90's.

Nothing touches natural gas. In a big house the HP sizing gets huge -- add drafts and they don't feels as comfortable.