Climate change is already affecting the U.S. and its economy. The majority of U.S. states have begun implementing major greenhouse gas mitigation-related measures. For example, the New York State Public Service Commission, in its order # 18-M-0084 of Jan. 16, 2020, authorized the NYS electric utilities portfolios of $2 billion on energy efficiency and heat pump rebates. The value of the customer rebates is based on potential savings to be recognized from the implementation of heat pump installation versus existing conventional heating and cooling systems. The comparison guiding document in the NYS is the technical resource manual (Ref.1) and the NYS Energy Conservation Construction Code (Ref.2), which adopts International Energy Conservation Code.
One of the challenges facing the building owner is the realistic comparison between the annual or seasonal efficiency of existing heating and cooling equipment with the proposed annual efficiency of the heat pump system and determination of the true cost that the potential customer is currently paying for useful heat and cooling consumed. The major factor in this determination is the individual customer’s boiler annual (seasonal) efficiency in converting the purchased fuel into useful heat. Quite often, the potential heat pump customer has no real knowledge of seasonal efficiency of his heating equipment.