Heat Pump Questions

[sly_karma]

0.76 ACH (air changes per hour) at final is excellent. This is where the diligent, thoughtful builders can really shine. A carefully planned and detailed air barrier isn't expensive, but it yields the greatest benefits, in all seasons and for the entire life of the building.

We have a spec builder in our CHBA local who consistently achieves 1.0 ACH or better, just with a well detailed exterior air barrier. They have one guy in the company they call the "Air Boss" who trains and supervises the framing crews while they're applying house wrap and installing windows. Additional materials costs are minor, more expensive tape and more caulk. Wall assemblies aren't anything special, 2x6 on 24" centres, but those spec homes achieve excellent Energuide ratings and they're still profitable.

 

[Rain City]

0.76 ACH (air changes per hour) at final is excellent. This is where the diligent, thoughtful builders can really shine. A carefully planned and detailed air barrier isn't expensive, but it yields the greatest benefits, in all seasons and for the entire life of the building.

We have a spec builder in our CHBA local who consistently achieves 1.0 ACH or better, just with a well detailed exterior air barrier. They have one guy in the company they call the "Air Boss" who trains and supervises the framing crews while they're applying house wrap and installing windows. Additional materials costs are minor, more expensive tape and more caulk. Wall assemblies aren't anything special, 2x6 on 24" centres, but those spec homes achieve excellent Energuide ratings and they're still profitable.

For us it's a bigtime team challenge. Even the apprentice is on air sealing duties at all times. Keeping lots of rolls of Siga tape around is key! This was a pretty standard detailing as well, no airobarrier, no peel and stick membrane, no liquid applied membrane. Just good building wrap and being on top of the trades penetrations. We seal to foundation, I used the new Siga tape for sealing the inside of the windows as well myself, instead of rod and caulk. Took me a full 2 days.

 

[sly_karma]

Siga must be just killing it, their tape is everyone's go to.

I'm impressed at how things have streamlined so much now that the bean counters in the large home builder outfits dug in on costs. It used to be that R2000 homes and the first efforts at Step 5 were loaded with complicated, over the top insulation and air/weather/vapour barrier assemblies. Now that the big boys have to make their homes perform too, they've shown ways to do it without crazy extra costs.

Really it's just a matter of properly planning and executing the air barrier, and using the best performing windows and doors available.

 

[big rock]

And here I am looking at wood burning inserts like some caveman. Im going to do wood upstairs and gas downstairs. Although I do have a heat pump ready to go for next spring when I need to cool her down

I prefer the caveman style.

 

[Deejray]

My heat pump makes some weird banging noise when it cuts in on colder days, minus temperatures. It is a 13 year old Trane modal. Had a tech look at it and he said I shouldn't operate it on colder days and switch it to e-heat.

Does that make sense?

do you have a crankcase heater? if not that could be an issue. refrigerant migrates to the coldest spot which in this case would be the compressor, this causes a hard start which could in turn cause a failure with your compressor.

 

[Salmon Seeker]

My hydro and gas bill are on the equal payment plan thing . I have a regular hot water tank about 4 years old and my high efficiency furnace 10+ years old . House is 55 years old .
Fortis - 86
Hydro - 135
There is some months we pay less or don’t pay at all.

What is the electricity bills with folks running all electric heat pumps and back up electric heat . Electric hot water etc .

My house is all electric. 1700 ft2. 1978. I just added a 4 zone mini split a year ago to accompany my baseboards. Im paying $199/mo on hydro's equal payment plan.

 

[chinnok]

do you have a crankcase heater? if not that could be an issue. refrigerant migrates to the coldest spot which in this case would be the compressor, this causes a hard start which could in turn cause a failure with your compressor.

Not sure if I have a crankcase heater, this only happens when I operated the heat pump in minus temperatures which I should not have. I just switch to e-heat now when it's cold. I have Trane IX15 modal heat pump and gas HE furnace.

 

[Fisherman Rob]

We agonized over replacing our forced air electric with a heatpump vs high efficient gas a few years back. Our house is 1963 so not very efficient compared to new construction. We ended up going natural gas because the costs of the heat pump was going to be too much, about $16k for a mid-range model and no rebates converting from electric forced air (this was a major gap in the rebates being offered, not sure if it's still the case). My calculations at the time were that it would take us ten years to break even, which was too long. Also I didn't like the idea that you need to keep the house at pretty much the same temp 24/7 and the heat pump would sit right outside our bedroom window. I did like the idea that in summer we would get cooling, but I had found that other houses, given floor vents, the cold air would stratify low in the room. The potential for costly maintenance of a heat pump was also a concern.

Now we are a few years in our hydro bill has come down dramatically, year over year more than 70% to about $150/m, and gas averages out to about $50/m.

 

[TheHurtLocker]

Remember this, Bc Hydro has been trying to increase their rates for the last 3 to 5 years. They have been shut down by the BC utilities commission. They just replaced the head of the BC utilities commission. This is for one reason, only to increase the rates in a matter of years. What this means is that our rates are going to be increased significantly, and also going to an actual real tiered system where you pay a lot more in prime electrical use zones.
If I could, I would go to a gas furnace and have a compressor for air conditioning. We replaced our electric furnace last year with a gas furnace a way better heat and way cheaper to run. For our heating system to be completely replaced, like I said, a new gas furnace and air conditioning unit outside was 13 K. Our savings on electricity is roughly 200 a billing period.
I totally disagree with Bc Hydro getting in the promotion business for heat pumps, for one we don’t have the capacity to put all of Bc Hydro residence on heat pumps and it’s more a political issue than anything. It comes down to what’s the price per kilojoule for gas and for electricity.

 

[Aces]

Remember this, Bc Hydro has been trying to increase their rates for the last 3 to 5 years. They have been shut down by the BC utilities commission. They just replaced the head of the BC utilities commission. This is for one reason, only to increase the rates in a matter of years. What this means is that our rates are going to be increased significantly, and also going to an actual real tiered system where you pay a lot more in prime electrical use zones.
If I could, I would go to a gas furnace and have a compressor for air conditioning. We replaced our electric furnace last year with a gas furnace a way better heat and way cheaper to run. For our heating system to be completely replaced, like I said, a new gas furnace and air conditioning unit outside was 13 K. Our savings on electricity is roughly 200 a billing period.
I totally disagree with Bc Hydro getting in the promotion business for heat pumps, for one we don’t have the capacity to put all of Bc Hydro residence on heat pumps and it’s more a political issue than anything. It comes down to what’s the price per kilojoule for gas and for electricity.

Don’t forget about the big push towards EV vehicles too

 

[spring fever]

Don’t forget about the big push towards EV vehicles too

Just because the gov't and their agencies are pushing it doesn't mean it's the best for you-just their agenda at the time.. If we all switched to EV's and heat pumps BC Hydro would be Hooped for capacity

 

[sly_karma]

Remember this, Bc Hydro has been trying to increase their rates for the last 3 to 5 years. They have been shut down by the BC utilities commission. They just replaced the head of the BC utilities commission. This is for one reason, only to increase the rates in a matter of years. What this means is that our rates are going to be increased significantly, and also going to an actual real tiered system where you pay a lot more in prime electrical use zones.
If I could, I would go to a gas furnace and have a compressor for air conditioning. We replaced our electric furnace last year with a gas furnace a way better heat and way cheaper to run. For our heating system to be completely replaced, like I said, a new gas furnace and air conditioning unit outside was 13 K. Our savings on electricity is roughly 200 a billing period.
I totally disagree with Bc Hydro getting in the promotion business for heat pumps, for one we don’t have the capacity to put all of Bc Hydro residence on heat pumps and it’s more a political issue than anything. It comes down to what’s the price per kilojoule for gas and for electricity.

If you want some more FUD to pile on top of that heaping helping, what will happen to domestic gas pricing once the LNG export takes off and much of it goes offshore?

Do you really know what BC Hydro's future capacity looks like? Is it not likely they see the same factors driving increased demand that you do? It is their business, after all. The proposed change they have in front of the BCUC at present is a peak/off peak tiered pricing system that would be opt-in, not imposed on subscribers across the board.

We are very fortunate to have our energy prices under the watchful eye of the BCUC, and not at the mercy of the open market. We only have to look at gasoline and diesel pricing to see how that would look.

 

[TheHurtLocker]

If you want some more FUD to pile on top of that heaping helping, what will happen to domestic gas pricing once the LNG export takes off and much of it goes offshore?

Do you really know what BC Hydro's future capacity looks like? Is it not likely they see the same factors driving increased demand that you do? It is their business, after all. The proposed change they have in front of the BCUC at present is a peak/off peak tiered pricing system that would be opt-in, not imposed on subscribers across the board.

We are very fortunate to have our energy prices under the watchful eye of the BCUC, and not at the mercy of the open market. We only have to look at gasoline and diesel pricing to see how that would look.

Here is something else to chew on. BCH was in a meeting last week with the majority of the First Nation bands in the province. They want to go away from all the signed agreements we have with them for easements for our transmission lines, sub stations and dams. They want to own them and get paid for them. This is coming down the pipe. Way more cost to the shareholders. We have been in meetings where we were told Site C is the last major project we will ever do because of this.

 

[Aces]

Just because the gov't and their agencies are pushing it doesn't mean it's the best for you-just their agenda at the time.. If we all switched to EV's and heat pumps BC Hydro would be Hooped for capacity

I concur

 

[Newf]

Just wanted to finish off this thread that I started and report that instead of a compressor replacement as I was planning to do, I went with a new unit installation. Installed the Samsung Hylex.

Being on a payment plan I've never looked at the bill in any detail and had not gone on the BCHydro website. After installing this unit I started to look at the BCHydro website and was impressed by the data you can find. Monthly bills as you would expect but all the past bills, monthly usage, daily usage and even hourly usage if you choose. If you follow your monthly bills, which I didn't, you can certainly narrow down the timeframe when you used the most electricity. I checked out last December/2022 as an example and found a few days when I had high usage and I knew that we weren't home and had the temperature set low in the house. I was able to pull up a graph for that month showing the average outside temperatures and it showed a drop in temperature to zero and below for those few days.

I was surprised and impressed to see that level of detail and didn't know it even existed. For those who like to track and analyze data, you can even export it into an excel spreadsheet.

Looked to see if the Gas company had this as well. Couldn't find anything like that. Maybe I didn't look in the right spot.

Thanks to all who provided their thoughts and insight to the thread, appreciated it.

 

[Aces]

Just wanted to finish off this thread that I started and report that instead of a compressor replacement as I was planning to do, I went with a new unit installation. Installed the Samsung Hylex.

Being on a payment plan I've never looked at the bill in any detail and had not gone on the BCHydro website. After installing this unit I started to look at the BCHydro website and was impressed by the data you can find. Monthly bills as you would expect but all the past bills, monthly usage, daily usage and even hourly usage if you choose. If you follow your monthly bills, which I didn't, you can certainly narrow down the timeframe when you used the most electricity. I checked out last December/2022 as an example and found a few days when I had high usage and I knew that we weren't home and had the temperature set low in the house. I was able to pull up a graph for that month showing the average outside temperatures and it showed a drop in temperature to zero and below for those few days.

I was surprised and impressed to see that level of detail and didn't know it even existed. For those who like to track and analyze data, you can even export it into an excel spreadsheet.

Looked to see if the Gas company had this as well. Couldn't find anything like that. Maybe I didn't look in the right spot.

Thanks to all who provided their thoughts and insight to the thread, appreciated it.

Pretty sure Fortis has tracking on daily use.

 

[profisher]

My plan is to just go gas as it is way more versatile and cheaper to change over to. . Gas options include, heat, hot water on demand, inserts or free standing stoves, dryers, stoves and barbi's. Heat pumps...heat and cool and that is it.

 

[N2013]

My plan is to just go gas as it is way more versatile and cheaper to change over to. . Gas options include, heat, hot water on demand, inserts or free standing stoves, dryers, stoves and barbi's. Heat pumps...heat and cool and that is it.

But the cool is so nice

 

[profisher]

But the cool is so nice

for the 2-3 days around here it gets over 85F.... and on those days we visit the basement lol

 

[N2013]

for the 2-3 days around here it gets over 85F.... and on those days we visit the basement lol

More than 2-3 days a year the past few years. We all can’t spend our summers out on the water where it’s nice and cool