Heat Pump Sales Slump In Europe
By Paul Homewood
h/t Patsy Lacey
I wonder why!!!
Europe’s heat pump market has hit a slump, industry data shows, holding up the continent’s efforts to heat its homes without polluting the planet.
Manufacturers in most markets sold fewer heat pumps in 2023 than they did the year before, according to the lobby group European Heat Pump Association (EHPA). Total sales fell 5% over the 14 countries for which data exists, bucking a trend of accelerating growth that peaked in 2022 when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine sent gas prices soaring.
Thomas Nowak, head of the EHPA, called on the EU to put together a promised action plan to build more heat pumps and install more of them in buildings.
Heat pumps, which act like refrigerators in reverse, use electricity to move untapped energy indoors. Their sales last year dropped 36% in Italy, 42% in Finland and 46% in Poland as gas prices fell and interest rates rose. Governments in some member states also cut support.
Newly released figures from the UK, which were not included in the EHPA calculations, show sales of the device grew 4% last year.
Germany, which saw heat pump sales jump 59% in 2023, was also one of six EU countries in which the market grew. The EHPA said this was partly a hangover from high demand the previous year, when orders could not be filled and customers were left waiting months to have heat pumps installed. The effect had run its course by the second half of 2023, the EHPA said.
The European slump in sales “is an extremely challenging setback for the EU’s efforts to decarbonise heating,” said Duncan Gibb, an analyst at clean energy thinktank Regulatory Assistance Project.
The European Commission aims to have about 60m heat pumps by the end of the decade but the current pace of installations – about 3m a year – will only get it to about 45m by then, said Gibb. “The EU needs a rapidly growing heat-pump market, not a shrinking one,” he said.
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Yes, well there ARE Gas fridges, but they burn gas, so just as well to burn the gas for heating, …. and SAVE the IMPORT of heat pumps.
Meanwhile Planet reality , I see more and more people buying OIL Burners for heating, even throwing out Wood Pellet stoves … Hmmm tell me why.
I didn’t know people were throwing out woodburners. Where is this happening? Brighton?
NO…..oh ! Cold & Remote Northern Scotland …. you want some ? May have a few for you! Considering starting up a business refurbishing and delivering them ( not installing them – but can help DIY at a price ;-)
We used to have a gas tumble dryer, and used it when it was too wet to hang the washing outside 🙂 . And it lasted for years, but eventually it was replaced with an electric powered dryer because there was no one with the qualifiactions to service it as it needed gas and electrical expertise. But, by then, we weren’t such a ‘young family’ and there was much less to dry each day.
We had a gas tumble dryer many years ago. It was supplied by British Gas, but they refused to fix it when it broke down. Never again.
Now out of curiosity, was it a “Gas” fuelled IC Engine like a Moped or strimmer with Kickstart ? Fell over just such an item online many years ago - from the ( Grand – in those days) USA. It was a WASHING Machine.
No idea!
I was too busy helping to look after the offspring, and paying off the mortgage. :) That’s pretty common, especially now, for young families.
I do know that the gas only provided the heat, while the Electricity was used to power the ‘tumble’ and provide the spark for the gas to ignite.
Ahhh, @Robert C, but that is the problem: I have to know a fair bit about a lot of things. and the more I know, the less I believe the “Update” rubbish from the Minions. Pity the pols and MSM don’t share my views but rely on so-called EX spurts , no more than just A wet Paintbrush on the wall.
“Eventually it was replaced with an electric powered dryer”
When the weather doesn’t allow outside clothes drying I still use the Creda “Reversomatic” Tumble Dryer that my late father bought in August 1978 – nearly 46 years ago! No electronics, just a simple clockwork timer, so it will probably out last me…
The installation of heat pumps is like putting the broken cart before the dead horse. With the current number of installers, it will be over a century before the majority of houses have one installed, and probably about as long before they are actually powered by renewable energy. Of course we will have moved on from this useless technology long beforehand.
I don’t see how heat pumps are environmentally friendly, they use electricity and have to be run constantly in order for them to work. Electricity is always claimed to be clean, as if causing pollution far enough away that you can’t see it doesn’t count.
” have to be run constantly in order for them to work “
Only in the sense that a refrigerator is always on — that is, a sensor turns these things on and off as the inside temperature changes. As far as I know most heaters work that way. Even my wood stove has a knob to turn that allows more or less air (Oxygen) in to control the burn rate. It is one heater that doesn’t just shut off.
Uptake of new tech, products is largely driven by word of mouth recommendations, and experiences of these that others have bought.
Of course this can have the opposite effect. That might explain the downturn in sales and reduced enthusiasm.
I had an air/water heat pump (replaced oil, piped gas not available) in France connected to underfloor piping and it worked really well – but it was twice the size of the unit in the picture – imagine an identical unit stacked on top, so double fan, and that would be about its size.
In cold climates you need big, powerful units, not the little units I see being promoted, unless you have a very small dwelling.
Sales of gas and oil heating are surging in Germany despite all the edicts to use electricity for heating but then costs for electricity are rising given Germany is run by morons as bad as ours when it comes to energy policy. But blackout news has an interesting additional cost should you have brain fade and instal a heat pump. EWE Netz charged €965 to remove the gas supply. An alternative would have been to pay an annual fee – no doubt variable – of €67.12 to deactivate the gas supply.
Is it surprising that a heat pump association is lobbying the government for more support.
Governments in general and certainly the U.K.’s believe they are marvellous devices and give magical free heat so are inclined to facilitate the heat pump industry.
Every description I see of heat pumps insinuates that there is ‘free’ heat or energy available from outside, as the above article states. This is false.
The heat pump industry uses the term Coefficient of Performance which is heat output against electrical unit input. This very often is called efficiency which it is not, true efficiency takes into account the energy required to produce the electricity and the losses in supply.
I have made this point before but some find it difficult to understand or accept? I certainly cannot convince the Department of Net Zero and Energy Security who swear that air source heat pumps are 280%, contrary to physical law.
Give us money and we’ll bribe politicians to hurt someone you hate. It’s an outsourced version of Murder, Inc.