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by ricardobayes 1516 days ago
Problem with that is electricity is expensive in Europe. Of course as you know Europe varies a lot between Portugal and Romania. While the first has a balmy 10C in winter daily low, colder areas can easily have -10C, -15C at night. That's the minimum operating range of a heat pump. That's a 30C difference to work through. That's why they have cheap (Russian) gas, it has the biggest energy density (and nuclear). Ground-source heat pumps would work better in continental Europe but they are expensive to install (I have only seen them in new build villas).
1 comments

Putting the gas into electric generators and using that electricity to heat is more economical than burning it in a furnace for heat, heat pumps are just that much better.

I agree that the national programme must be more detailed than just declaiming "heat pumps!" and calling it even.

I gestured vaguely at the existence of parts of Europe where cheap mini-splits might not be sufficient, let's just agree I'm talking about the places where they will be.

Apologies if my comment made it seem I disagree with you. Air-source heat pumps can definitely be used in many countries here, in fact they are already popular in the UK, and gaining popularity in Spain, due to their efficiency.