This is in response to the (letter) “Right to be cool” of September 26. 2024. This article needs a reality check.
Is transition to heat pumps a solution to what it describes as “reducing our reliance on toxic fossil fuels”?
First, one needs to understand what a heat pump is. Heat pumps work by transferring heat from one location to another. It uses components such as evaporator, condenser and compressor driven by an electrical motor and a fan also driven by an electrical motor.
In the summer heat is transferred from inside of the house to the already hot air outside, thus heating the outside air even more.
In the winter heat is transferred for the outside to the inside of the house, thus cooling the outside air even more.
In climates like Cochrane, very cold temperatures will reduce the available heat in the air drastically. This will result in reduced efficiency. Heat pumps will struggle to extract heat form the cold air. This will increase electricity consumption and greatly offset their eco-friendly benefits.
Most houses have a 100-ampere electrical service. There is a good chance that this electrical service needs to be upgraded to a 200-ampere to accommodate the load of the heat pump. This definitely would be the case, if one would get rid of the ICE vehicles and replace them with EVs that need to be charged. Yes, those chargers are connected to the electrical panel and load the electrical system even more.
Let’s assume that everyone in Cochrane would get rid of Natural Gas in the house. In my case I need to replace my gas cooktop, water heaters, furnace and garage heater.
A quick calculation reveals it would cost at least twenty-five to thirty thousand dollars.
It does not stop there. The utility transformer that supplies electricity to our houses will need to be upgraded. All the electrical infrastructure way back to the power generation stations as well. If you have an underground service to your house, some serious groundwork needs to be done. Your neighbourhood will be a mess. And I am not even mentioning the industrial and commercial buildings. I doubt it if the generation stations have the capacity to supply all this extra electricity.
Considering all this, the cost of upgrades to the electrical infrastructure in Cochrane would be staggering.
Now just imagine this to be done across the Great White North as suggested. In my wildest imagination I can not figure out how this would result in lower utility cost!
As suggested “the federal government must act now to bring this program to life." How? Who is going to pay for all of it? The government?
The Canadian debt as of today is about 1.2 trillion! We can add to that, or can we? There are better solutions, I think. To start, our building codes need to be reviewed and updated.
It needs to address a variety of issues such as preventing hail damage and basements floods, energy efficiency just to name a few.
One of the outcomes must be to provide Heat and AC to our homes, to charge EVs with the existing 100-ampere electrical service.
Natural Gas heaters could be used as a heat supplement in case of very cold temperatures.
It would be better to spend money on upgrades on homes to address those issues. This is where subsidies might come in.
Gary Kooistra
Cochrane, AB
