Residential Heat Pumps
Residential
Warming Up a Cold Market: Accelerating Heat Pump Technology in the Northwest
NEEA’s holistic Market Transformation process has advanced the performance and availability of efficient Heating and cooling heat pump technology for Northwest homes. These efforts include guiding product development by testing emerging products, equipping manufacturers with critical performance data, and cultivating a healthy market in the Northwest by generating awareness among consumers and product expertise among installers.
Although heat pump systems were invented in the 1850s, the technology was slow to penetrate the U.S. market. NEEA set out to accelerate their adoption and effective use in Northwest homes through groundbreaking HVAC programs, including the Ductless Heat Pump program and Advanced Heat Pump program. Together, these programs demonstrate the potency and flexibility of NEEA’s Market Transformation approach across a variety of technologies, applications and markets.
Ductless Heat Pump Program
In 2008, NEEA launched a pilot to demonstrate the viability of ductless heating and cooling systems to displace less-efficient electric resistance heating in existing Northwest homes. At the time, ductless system manufacturers saw little potential for this technology in the Northwest, or even in the country, and installers had limited experience with the technology.
To transform these market conditions, NEEA built a regionwide foundation to support future utility programs, including working with manufacturers, distributors and contractors to make the products available and generate contractor trust and installation skills.
Working in concert with Northwest utilities’ incentive and awareness efforts, NEEA’s ductless system Market Transformation program has yielded impressive results. For example, 96% of Northwest HVAC installation companies surveyed in 2021 reported installing ductless systems, and multiple Northwest distributors won national accolades from their manufacturing partners for top sales performance. These installers reported they “always” or “often” recommend a ductless system when applicable. The program’s efforts have also significantly expanded ductless system training opportunities throughout the region, with many utilities, distributors and manufacturers developing their own training programs.
12% of Northwest single-family homes have a ductless system
Source: NEEA 2022 Residential Building Stock Assessment
Advanced Heat Pump Program
After identifying the opportunity for a Market Transformation path for heat pumps in more complex HVAC systems, NEEA employed its iterative Market Transformation process to understand the barriers the region would need to overcome. These challenges included helping the market distinguish high-performing units
from suboptimal alternatives.
In response, the alliance convened partners across North America to develop a load-based test and rating
procedure for residential air-source heat pumps and air conditioners, with an eye to systems that operate
efficiently regardless of variance in design or installation. These efforts, known as NEEA’s Advanced Heat
Pump Program, continue to build alignment with other voices in the energy efficiency community through
venues like the North American Advanced Heat Pump Coalition, which NEEA helped launch in 2019. By
building this coalition, NEEA moves the market using a collective voice and shared research to influence test
procedures, specifications and standards that differentiate products with the most impactful features and
capabilities, and represent the needs of the Northwest.
Building on this work, NEEA aims to lock in heat pump efficiency above current standards through
improvements to the federal test procedure, support for minimum standards across all residential multi-speed heat pump applications, and continued collaboration with manufacturers to effect permanent changes
in heat pump design and production.
The program’s goal is to promote systems with these improvements in the Northwest so that by 2030,
average installed efficiency of residential-size heat pumps will be 30% more efficient than the 2017 average