@[email protected]M to Climate - truthful information about climate, related activism and [email protected]English • 10 months ago
@[email protected]M to Climate - truthful information about climate, related activism and [email protected]English • 10 months ago
The article doesn’t go into it, but a key advantage they have is that heat pumps move heat, rather then trying to generate it. So they can move a lot more heat into your house than would be generated by running the electricity they use through a resistor. This makes them effectively more than 100% efficient (the exact amount depends on temperature) as compared with burning a fuel or resistive heat.
This is the same reason electric cars beats ICE (gas driven) cars even when charged on coal power. Big coal plants and the distribution grid are more efficient than small scale car engines.
You need combustion engines to be BIG to get past 30-40% efficiency ranges, but the really big power plants can just perform efficient burns and heat water to drive efficient turbines, which is impossible in cars. And the rest of losses in electric cars are either minimal or equivalent, so you get a big net benefit.
Even better than that is an electric bus and other public transit!
Even better when your busses/transit are powered by a pantograph.