Prioritizing Heat Pump QA Inspections Based on Early Indicators of Energy Performance

Energy Trust of Oregon’s Residential program began testing a new approach to Heat Pump QA inspections in Spring 2022. The key concept driving this approach is identifying and prioritizing sites for QA inspections based on early indicators of energy consumption reductions after a new heat pump replacing an existing electric forced air furnace (eFAF) has been installed. Sites demonstrating both large and small reductions in energy use after the HP installation are prioritized for QA to support the goal of identifying which site characteristics, heat pump performance metrics, and other installation factors are correlated with high and/or low reductions in energy use.  Those learnings may then be used to inform updated program requirements and specifications that are intended to improve overall realized energy savings for utility delivered heat pump incentive programs. This presentation will describe the approach used to identify candidate sites for heat pump QA inspections, highlight a small number of interesting case studies, and present preliminary results and learnings gleaned to date. Lastly, this presentation will also describe potential program requirement changes the Energy Trust Residential program is considering implementing to improve realized energy savings for heat pump conversion projects.