What ECMs Are Complementary Projects That Can Be Combined With Heat Pump Upgrades? | Video

CIET's Ask Us Anything series is a free monthly Q&A session with industry experts.

In the Commercial Heat Pumps session, subject-matter expert, Peter Rowles, answered many topical questions. In this Ask Us Anything highlight, he answers a two-part question about projects that complement heat pump upgrades as well as how multiple specialized contractors can work together on these types of projects.

Watch the video or read the transcript below.

Question: What Energy Conservation Measures (ECMs) are complementary projects that can be combined with heat pump upgrades?

Answer:

Peter: One of the things I've learned after spending many years doing some pretty elaborate heat pump projects is that in the facilities I was looking at, a lot of people hadn't done the basics; lighting, retrofits, insulation, even basic awareness stuff. A lot of that stuff you need to do first to drive down your heat load and your cooling load, because the more you can do to drive your peak heating and cooling loads down, the smaller the system that you need. So that's going to drive the capital cost down and improve the savings.

The other side of things with heat pumps is to look at passive heat recovery and try to incorporate it into the design of your system. There's a little bit of a bigger opportunity in the commercial sector because you've got a large source of waste water streams, waste exhaust air, large enough to make it economic to make recovery. Even on the residential scale, you're seeing greywater recovery systems and you've got heat recovery systems. I think if you can look at trying to integrate heat recovery with a heat pump in both of those settings, you're looking at basically increasing the overall system COP (Coeffecient of performance). It's great savings, faster payback, and all those attributes.

Olivier: The second part of the questions is around any recommendations you might have about how multiple specialized contractors can work together on smaller commercial jobs. I think that's a really topical question just because the scalability of this is being halted a bit by the parameters and types of people who can do installation, the type of contractors that are attracted to this type of work, so maybe you could speak to that.

Peter: I think this is kind of an extension of the new construction market where we get into integrated design process. I think especially with heat pumps there really needs to be this cooperation with the designers and the installers, and there's no replacement for actual experience. We can sit around and talk theory and even design principles, but I think the team working together needs to work through the project together and understand what the correlations are between insulation, lighting, plumbing, HVAC, ventilation, air quality, etc. There's a lot of interaction between those, and to try to do it in a silo approach just leads ultimately to problems.

There's a need for collaboration throughout the whole design-installation phase. I think it serves all groups well to have a good installation, as opposed to one that goes bad... because the bad ones haunt you for years.

Did you miss this Ask Us Anything session?

Here's another video highlight you might be interested in: Are cold climate heat pumps on the horizon for commercial rooftop units?

Want to learn more about heat pumps?

The Heat Pumps Essentials course is designed to equip energy efficiency industry professionals with the knowledge and skills needed to understand, select, and advocate for heat pumps in residential, commercial, or industrial settings. The course covers the most important aspects of heat pumps, notably basic functioning, the different types of heat pumps, and refrigerants.

This one-day course provides participants with the tools needed to develop a comprehensive understanding of heat pumps systems and skills to pitch heat pump projects to clients from all sectors. An integrative sales scenario activity at the end of the course sets participants up for success in the HVAC industry.

Read more about what you can learn from this course and find an upcoming session.