Selling and installing heat pumps: influencing household practices

When installing energy-efficient technologies in housing, such as heat pumps, the energy savings predicted by technical analyses are often not realized, resulting in a performance gap. This study focuses on air-to-air heat pumps in residential settings. Interviews with actors in Scandinavia who are involved in selling and installing heat pumps are analysed to understand what role these actors have in relation to the performance gap. Previous studies have focused on households and their everyday practices with heat pumps. This study focuses on the process of integrating the heat-pump technologies into homes, and analyses the role of professional practices from supply-side actors (e.g. advice, provision and installation) in relation to questions of residential comfort, know-how and use, as well as the material (physical) integration of heat pumps into homes. In analysing these questions, the study’s contribution is a focus on how to understand material elements within practice–theoretical approaches. From a policy perspective, the analysis shows that a sole focus on the efficiency of technologies is too limited in terms of achieving reduced energy consumption. There is potential for different actors on the provision side to be assigned new roles in order to realize more energy savings.