The heat pump versus air conditioners debate is running hot in British Columbia this summer, with climate experts critiquing Premier David Eby’s plan to spend C$10 million on 8,000 free air conditioners for the province’s most vulnerable populations.
The funding is part of the government’s response to the heat dome that killed 619 people in 2021, reports CBC News. The BC Coroners Service death review panel found that most of the people who died had no access to cooling of any kind—and many of them were particularly vulnerable, being elderly, disabled, or both.
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Providing air conditioning is one way to prevent a recurrence of the tragic event, the panel said. But it also suggested [pdf] building codes that require passive and active cooling like heat pumps, insulation, ventilation, greening, tree canopy, and permeable landscapes to mitigate the effects of extreme heat.
Veteran B.C. climate consultant Alex Boston, who was part of the panel, was tepid in his assessment of the government’s aircon distribution plan. While he acknowledged that they make sense as a quick fix, air conditioners are costly to purchase and operate, and overdependence on them during heat events could lead to blackouts—which would then render the technology useless.
Boston recommended that policy-makers implement other measures like external shades on south and western exposures of buildings. He also urged Victoria to recognize the cooling power of an urban tree canopy and ensure more trees are planted as quickly as possible in neighbourhoods that lack them.
Ontario-based climate consultant Heather McDiarmid told CBC it makes sense for the province to try and help as many people as possible by providing less expensive cooling devices, but noted it was not the best solution from a climate perspective.
She said the province should do more to get heat pumps into people’s homes: they’re more energy efficient, she said, and beyond their installation costs, they’re much cheaper than traditional AC.
“A heat pump is absolutely the way to go,” said McDiarmid, noting that unlike air conditioners, heat pumps also provide heat in winter.
“If you go with a heat pump instead of an air conditioner, in the wintertime, you are potentially saving quite a lot in terms of emissions because the electricity used to run the heat pump has a much lower carbon footprint than burning gas to generate heat.”
So far, there are about 200,000 heat pumps installed across the province, about 10% of them in private homes, CBC writes. “B.C. has strongly promoted heat pumps to reduce people’s reliance on fossil fuels.”
Owners of single-family detached homes who install a heat pump in B.C. can tap into as much as $11,000 in municipal, provincial, and federal rebates. However, strata and condominium owners are not eligible for any heat pump rebates. That’s because condo buildings already consume two-thirds less energy than detached homes, explained BC Hydro, which administers the rebate program.
But condos can still become lethally and inescapably hot in the summer, lacking many of the natural cooling advantages of detached homes like air circulation and the shelter of tall trees and backyards.
And because condos tend to be cheaper than detached homes, owners often have less secure incomes and can’t afford the full cost of buying and installing a heat pump, which can run as high as $27,000.
Even so, a BC Hydro spokesperson said the purpose of the program is “to help those customers interested in fuel-switching from gas to electricity, or with high electricity consumption.”
And demand for heat pump rebates is skyrocketing. “So far this year, more than 10,000 people have applied for the rebates—over 40% more than applied all of last year, and over triple the applicants in 2021,” CBC says.
Anyone seeking their way out of the aircon/heat pump quagmire may look to Ontario-based social housing providers like YWCA Kitchener-Waterloo and Indwell, the national broadcaster reports. The two organizations are among many that are using green building standards like Passive House, and materials like mass timber, to build affordable, climate-safe, sustainable homes.
Indwell’s director of projects and development, Graham Cubitt, said social housing providers commit to caring for their buildings for decades, so they’re hard-wired to think long-term, and to maximize their return on every dollar they spend. That means recognizing up front that designing energy-efficient buildings is much cheaper than shoehorning in energy upgrades later.
“We wouldn’t have the money to retrofit buildings,” Cubitt said.
Living in green, affordable housing has changed the lives of many vulnerable people, he added. In their previous homes, many of Indwell’s tenants could afford neither heat nor cooling. Now, Cubitt said, “they’re saving everything. They’re saving money, they’re saving the planet.”
What about the size of the apartment units in non-profits, where many low income seniors and persons-with disability live? Where do you put AC units, in terms of space? Window units (as shown in the above picture) are prohibited. Many have balcony doors only. I have been pushing for a heat pump since the heat dome where I landed in the hospital and waited for 9 hours because it would not interfere with my balcony door, which is the only doorway to put in a air conditioner. Unfortunately (and I fully understand) non-profit landlords cannot retrofit every unit with a heat pump. So this AC debate doesn’t seem to take into consideration the unit size, and configuration, and whether AC’s can fit well. Because of illnesses, some people cannot tolerate AC’s, although I’m thinking dual hose would solve the problem. Again, where do you put them. Units were never designed for AC’s…in design or square footage.
THANK YOU so much for adding this, RM!