A review of factors affecting environmental and economic life-cycle performance for electrically-driven heat pumps

摘要

Space heating and cooling together with sanitary hot water supply have a significant share, approximately 50 %, of the global energy consumption of buildings. In order to fulfil energy and energy-efficiency building requirements, European and national legislations encourage the use of more sustainable heating and cooling options. A sustainable dimension implies that both environmental and economic aspects are taken into account; the life-cycle comparisons of different heating and cooling systems are therefore based on GHG emissions and costs. This work focuses only on the economic side of the life-cycle analyses (therefore excluding the environmental dimension) and presents a review of life-cycle cost (LCC) studies involving HP systems. The first objective is to present an overview of the most influential factors characterizing life-cycle cost methodologies for HP systems and to suggest methodological improvements which can make LCC analyses more robust. The second objective is to present an overview of factors influencing both the economic and the environmental success of HP systems. A greater awareness and understanding of these factors can, at a macro-level, increase confidence in HP systems so that governments can identify appropriate actions and develop legislation that provide support for HPs implementation.