View Full Version : What happened when a couple tried to decarbonize their home
Very interesting article
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/mar/21/decarbonizing-your-home-solar-heat-pump
Obviously, this article is of great interest to me, living outside of Burlington and also having purchased heat pumps and having received quotes for solar in the past year. Thanks for posting. I'm going to read it more carefully. This quote hit me: "My wife found her limit when we were forced to choose between cutting emissions or cutting trees."
It is a very complex issue. We rejected solar panels because we would have had to cut down a big maple and utilize both our roof and the yard where we have vegetable gardens for solar panels. There was no way! I object heartily to using arable land as viable space for solar panels. Yes, I am big on climate change, but I really lean toward the principles of the Deep Greens in that capitalism and industry are fundamentally incompatible with sustainability. And so my personal preference for solutions to climate change are cutting back on consumption all around, and demanding more of corporations in terms of making them accountable for the costs of environmental externalities in their business practices. And I also am against "green" mandates that create hardships on the regular working people.
It all makes home life decisions very complex. There are pros and cons to every decision. This article aptly points that out. Thanks for sharing.
Glad it was of interest!
I rent so I’m extremely limited in what I can do. Gas forced air furnace that was 40 years old was replaced two years ago with same, but of course, much more efficient. Gas water heater replaced last year. That was over 20 years old. Landlord paid for replacements. This is a rented small condo. Stove and clothes dryer are already electric.
I’ve read plenty of articles about the UK and EU wanting people to replace existing gas fired heating with heat pumps, but the cost is high.
I was happy to see solar panels are starting to show up on roofs in townhouse developments locally.
I’ve bookmarked the article for when I have more time to give it the consideration it deserves. My initial comment though is that our heat pump has been great. This winter we never had a gas/electric bill over $300. Last year we had several months of $400+ bills. And both gas and electric rates were over 15% cheaper last year. And the environmental impact is even better. Our utility doesn’t use any fossil fuels so switching to electric heat makes a huge difference for our impact as far as that goes.
I’ve bookmarked the article for when I have more time to give it the consideration it deserves. My initial comment though is that our heat pump has been great. This winter we never had a gas/electric bill over $300. Last year we had several months of $400+ bills. And both gas and electric rates were over 15% cheaper last year. And the environmental impact is even better. Our utility doesn’t use any fossil fuels so switching to electric heat makes a huge difference for our impact as far as that goes.
You don’t live where it really gets cold, though. Just like EVs, heat pumps in really cold climates might not be the best solution.
You don’t live where it really gets cold, though. Just like EVs, heat pumps in really cold climates might not be the best solution.
They are getting much better. The companies up here in VT are doing a bang-up business in heat pumps. We used ours exclusively this winter and it kept up fine with the cold temperatures, but next year we're going back to using more of the wood stove as a complementary heat source, just because we missed it this year, and we also learned that the cost of a cord of wood + the heat pump is cheaper than the increase in the heating bill of JUST the heat pump. However, the heat pump is definitely more efficient and cost-effective than the old baseboards that we used to use.
DH wants a new stove, but he wants a gas stove. I am going to fight hard against that decision, because we would have to use propane--there are no natural gas lines where I live. I am going to start him thinking about induction. Our current electrode stove is terrible and our options are very limited for the size we need--20-24 inches wide.
As for solar, I've considered one of the community solar programs we have here, but haven't really done any work on that yet.
In cold climates like yours, I’ve heard of people having electric bill shock when they switched from natural gas to a heat pump. In many urban/suburban parts of the Midwest, natural gas is king and cheaper than heating with electricity.
I have a 15 yo basic, glass top electric stove that was installed not long after I moved into this rented condo. It’s been more than 15 years since I cooked on gas. I have no problems with it. Induction stoves are expensive and you may have to replace your cookware. Would a newer electric stove fit the bill? One that’s not induction, I mean.
catherine
4-29-24, 11:04am
Would a newer electric stove fit the bill? One that’s not induction, I mean.
Regarding the natural gas vs heat pump, it would be hard for me to compare my old natural gas heating prices in my NJ home with my heat pump prices here because my home here is 1/3 of the size of my NJ home. I think if you live in a house that's considered midsized today (1800-2500 sq ft maybe?) it might be higher than natural gas but I don't know so I can't argue with what you've heard from others.
Regarding induction vs electric--I am fine with electric even though our specific stove is a piece of crap. I'm trying to appease my DH who thinks Gordon Ramsey is God. Gas is the medium of great chefs, according to him. I'm trying to sell him on the wave of the future and the benefits of induction in terms of accurate and fast heat.
Yeah, the foodies are the ones I hear gripe about gas be electric.
The only problem I had when switching from gas (growing up) to electric in 1970! was that I burned things by not taking pans off the heat. With gas is stops, with elec. it stays hot still. No problems since I learned that lesson! We to would have to use propane and I am not doing that! don't they make little induction hot plates that you could experiment on before investing in a big new stove?
Yes, there are induction hot plates. The one from IKEA gets good reviews and I think it can be ordered online.
iris lilies
4-29-24, 3:30pm
we are running a heat pump in our sunroom. It’s just one room, but it’s had two years to run and it seems to be doing OK.
Yes, there are induction hot plates. The one from IKEA gets good reviews and I think it can be ordered online.
After using my friend's induction hotplate for a couple of weeks to make coffee I bought my own. I love it for that but haven't started experimenting with it for other stuff. Part of my issue is that it's in our dining room because we've learned that half our house, including all of the kitchen and half the living room including the internet modem, is on one electric circuit.* Putting it in the dining room prevents us from dealing with blown circuit breakers, but makes it awkward if I want to cook with it.
*I wish we'd been aware of this when we did the recent renovations but it didn't pop up as a problem until after everything was done and put back together. It would've been a minor detail to move stuff to different circuits when we had the walls opened up in the kitchen and downstairs bathroom. Now it would be a stupid expensive project that would add zero value to the house so we'll just live with it.
ApatheticNoMore
5-2-24, 2:43am
I've done what I could do, I cook mostly with a toaster oven and an induction hot plate. If something doesn't fit in the toaster oven (most things do) or I need multiple burners I'll use the gas stove that came with the apartment. Hot water is on gas.
I don't really think the objections to electric/induction are much of ones. The power demand, yes if the induction burner is on the very highest setting (the boil setting) at the same time as the toaster oven is on, it consistently flips a circuit breaker. Most (all?) of the kitchen seems on the same circuit breaker. But I know not to do that. And this place is probably running on the original electrical wiring from 60 years ago or something. Really, I think it is.
Yes induction has a learning curve but I have learned. As for being a foodie, I sometimes consider myself one, but I guess I'm an Alice Waters type foodie and it's all about the quality of ingredients with me and only very rarely about the particular burner one uses for cooking. Gas companies pay people on the food network etc. to hype gas, I'm not buying the hype of their paid promoters. Most pots/pans will work on induction but if you have to get all new pots/pans, that's a legit complaint.
I don't have control over everything as a renter, but dense apartments are probably overall better for the environment anyway despite the dream of owning allowing one to control everything and optimize it. This isn't exactly the most dense of apartments though, but it's not particularly large.
The only real objections to non-gas cooking I’ve seen is that they don’t work very well with woks.
The only real objections to non-gas cooking I’ve seen is that they don’t work very well with woks.
That's an interesting observation. And not one I would've ever thought of. But it makes sense since the surface area of a wok on the burner is actually quite small. I actually did a stir fry shrimp and broccoli thing last week using the little induction burner hotplate we have and it worked really well. We don't have a wok so I used our biggest frying pan and basically accomplished the same goal of woks, higher heat in the middle, lower heat at the edges so that you can speed up/slow down cooking of various ingredients by moving them one direction or the other. It worked pretty well, but I'm not in any way a professional chef so I'm sure there was some compromise in quality that a true stir fry chef would have been aghast by.
I’ve actually seen articles that the no-gas cooking push discriminates against Asian people and their traditional cooking methods.
I’ve actually seen articles that the no-gas cooking push discriminates against Asian people and their traditional cooking methods.
This got me curious. A quick search on amazon finds that people make standalone induction burners specifically for woks. I don't know enough about woks to know how practical this is. For instance whether woks are made out of steel that works with induction or if they are typically non-inductionable materials. I assume that good woks are seasoned like a good cast iron pan (and treated with the same reverence as grandma's past down cast iron pan is) so they'd probably work with induction assuming the wok and burner are the same size/shape? If they are a standard size then I imagine they would.
happystuff
5-8-24, 10:53am
Interesting thread. I like that cast iron is okay to use on induction burners as that is what my huge wok is made of. Heavy as H@ll, but cooks great.
Powered by vBulletin® Version 4.2.5 Copyright © 2025 vBulletin Solutions Inc. All rights reserved.