Heat pump sales outpaced gas furnace sales in the US in 2022
I very nearly bought a heat pump for my house to replace (or augment) my natural gas furnace, but was dissuaded by the salesperson.<p>He who pointed out that, while heat pumps are miracles of efficiency, the electricity in my area is primarily generated by burning fossil fuels such as coal and natural gas. Due to transmission losses, it is cheaper, efficient, and greener to combust natural gas for warmth directly than to burn it at a power plant, feed the power into the grid, and use grid power to run a heat pump.<p>Of course, running a heat pump allows you to take advantage of greener power sources when they become available, but his claim was that in a lot of places they don't really benefit the environment right now. Anyone have any numbers to back this up or refute it?