The cost of living.

[Workingman]

Next thing you know is that we'll be importing billions of plastic bottles filled with water from France, Spain and Italy because we are so desperately short of the stuff.

These things drive me insane.

[TheOstrich]

Interesting that the French have, I believe, brought in new rules about plastic use from today. I understand there will be no wrapping of cucumbers, and fruit and vegetables will have to be sold loose and not in plastic bags.
I am not sure what this will mean for either the quality or longevity of veg, etc .....

[Workingman]

Excellent news. There is no reason for quality to drop and it might mean that the veg gets to the shops in a fresher state. Some of the stuff we call "fresh" has been deep chilled for weeks. It also gives the shopper the chance to buy only what they need - less wastage.

Another thing would be to get all the other packaging made from recyclable materials. I saw a thing the other day about invisible barcodes digitally watermarked into plastics and other wrappings to help with recycling. We cannot see them but the machines can and then and sort items into different streams. No more looking for the icon, just pop everything in the green bin.

Next thing to do is make wonky veg the norm. Perfectly edible food is ploughed back in just because it does not look right. Some of it goes to be made into animal feedstock so it is not "wasted" in the real sense, but it is certainly not all.

[Suff]

Most of our veg is already unwrapped in the supermarket. You can tell when we import cucumbers as they are wrapped, but not in growing season in France.

The biggest impact for these rules will be the likes of LIDL and Aldi who import most of their veg.

My suspicion is that the law is half about the environment and half about disrupting competition from German supermarket chains. Which would make it typically French.

[Suff]

You're right, it's not rocket science, it's practicality. Put the glossy brochures down and think.

Is it worth going back to square 1 and remembering that these regulations are for new builds and existing boiler replacements.

If a high rise apartment doesn't have CH it also doesn't have a gas boiler. It will already be on electric. Therefore the only reason for the owner to change will be cost and since a HVAC air air system is many times more efficient than normal electric heating, cost will eventually drive the change.

As for the size of an Air source heat pump? It is extremely hard to get away from everyone who wants to give you "size" as the power capacity, however I did find one site which had the info. Air source, not larger than a washing machine, ground source, many times larger.

This is equivalent to the many aircon units I have seen mounted between high rise windows both in Europe and Asia.

I'm not reading the glossy brochures I'm digging into the details.

[Suff]

One thing came to mind today.
Council houses, or I suppose housing association houses th these days. How much money is it going to cost to upgrade all of these properties with a heat pump?

Only when the boiler needs replacement or the cost of running the boiler is prohibitive.

Yes, many billions. No, not more billions than are already spent on replacing existing boilers which are too old. People who rent will force the change when the cost of gas becomes prohibitive and heat pump/electric becomes significantly cheaper?

We also have to remember that prices are not just down to a country. The world has decided to get off gas fossil fuel. That means the producers need more money for the reduced product we are going to use or to take a significant hit.

Just like the fuel crisis in the 70's, it is guaranteed that the cost of gas is going to rise by many multiples of the price of early 2021.

Are owners and renters going to continue to want gas CH when HP on electric is cheaper?

This is not a discussion of relative merits or costs. This is a discussion on where best to spend the limited money we have. On legacy gas which is going to drive costs up dramatically? Or on modern HVAC which will dovetail well with current low emissions energy generating initiatives?

It is about looking and walking forward instead of walking backwards and bemoaning bumping into everything.

[Suff]

Whilst talking about these costs and the direction governments are going, I came across this in a post. It is well worth reading.

In the US roughly 237 TWH of coal is burned per month to produce 76 TWH of electricity. Similarly roughly 292 TWH of gas is burned per month to produce 129 TWH of electricity. Renewables only need to replace 205 TWH of electricity to displace 529 TWH of fossil fuels on your graph.
The remaining coal and gas is used directly for heat. One could argue that that should be replaced at about 1 TWH of fossil fuel burned for about 0.94 TWH of electrical heat but that assumes resistive heating. If a heat pump is used that becomes 1 TWH of fossil fuel burned for about 2.5 TWH of electrical heat. So 71 TWH of fossil fuel heat can be replaced by 28 TWH of electric heat.
Your graph shows about 600 TWH of coal and gas but that can be replaced by about 233 TWH of renewables.

This is why they are looking at heat pumps. It is 19th century technology v 21st century technology and the impact is clear.