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I have a ducted heat pump system. I have credible sources telling me both to turn down the thermostat overnight, and others that say to keep it at a constant temperature. Who's right?

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Hi Alex!

Good question and unfortunately the TL;DR is "it's complicated". Lots of factors involved, including leakage rate of your house, heat pump efficiency as a function of (indoor temp, outdoor temp, thermostat temp), etc. I suspect this is more true the more well insulated a house is, but I don't know.

The only thing I would trust is solid data which you gather yourself from your own house with an energy monitor + correlated temperature monitor.

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Have done the same thing myself.

I'm curious how quickly most consumers will go about the same process, natural gas rates are in the process of spiraling upwards as homes electrify, but usage will also go down incrementally as people get a heat pump and use their main furnace less, or get induction hot plates and just use less gas.

My furnace went out and I realized that it was easier than I thought to switch everything else over. After the furnace all had left was gas for cooking, which turned out to be easy (got some hot plates as a medium term solution).

As the technology for long term carbon free solutions (heat pumps/ranges with batteries) it is also worth noting that even the medium term solutions are getting better.

Rewiring America has done great work publishing how easy this is, but many consumers still don't realize that they are locking themselves into expensive bills for decades with new gas equipment. I would personally bet that a decent amount of consumers divest of gas earlier than projections with how the technology is advancing. Thanks for sharing.

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