Vermonters are installing cold-climate heat pumps at high rates, according to new data from Efficiency Vermont.
Vermont ranks first in New England for heat pump installations per capita, having installed an all-time total of roughly 63,000 heat pumps in homes and businesses, Efficiency Vermont reported on Monday. That’s 97 heat pumps for every 1,000 Vermont residents.
Of the 63,000 heat pumps installed in Vermont, more than 57,000 are residential, and almost 6,000 are commercial.
Vermont is followed closely by Maine, where residents and businesses have installed more heat pumps in total — roughly 131,000 — but fewer per capita, at 94 heat pumps per 1,000 residents. Meanwhile, Massachusetts, a state with roughly 7 million residents, installed fewer than 30,000 heat pumps between 2020 and the first half of 2023, the time period for which the state has recorded data about rebated installations.
Recently, state lawmakers, municipal leaders and environmental groups have taken steps to encourage Vermonters to install heat pumps, usually with an eye on reducing climate emissions that come from the heating and cooling of buildings.
But some of those actions — most notably, the passage of a law in 2023 that created the foundation for a clean heat standard — have not yet been implemented. A new ordinance in Burlington allows the city to charge developers a fee when they install heating systems that run on fossil fuels in newly constructed buildings, but the change only took effect on Jan. 1.
Still, Vermonters have been steadily installing an increasing number of heat pumps throughout the last decade, according to the data from Efficiency Vermont. In 2015, the organization helped Vermonters install around 1,300 of the systems. That number jumped to around 4,600 by 2018, and hovered at around 10,000 annually from 2020 to 2022. In 2023, Vermonters installed 11,451 heat pumps in homes and businesses through the organization, the highest annual total to date.
In addition to those numbers, Burlington Electric Department helped area residents and businesses install 2,086 heat pumps between 2015 and 2023.
Officials at Efficiency Vermont suspect that those who have installed heat pumps are looking to reduce their carbon emissions, and that they’ve been driven by financial incentives offered by the organization.
The organization’s partnerships with utilities and contractors have created trust in Vermont, and helped enforce the message that “today’s heat pumps will work well in Vermont’s climate,” said Phil Bickel, the heat pump program manager at Efficiency Vermont.
Still, Vermonters with low or moderate incomes may have trouble affording the systems.
While rebates through Efficiency Vermont range from $350 to around $2,000, and additional incentives are available through the state’s electric utilities, people with low and moderate incomes have represented a small percentage of heat pump installations in Vermont in recent years.
Those with qualifying incomes are eligible for an extra rebate from Efficiency Vermont. In 2022, 783 of the 10,961 installations qualified for that rebate. In 2023, 631 of the 11,451 installations qualified.
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated the year in which Efficiency Vermont helped Vermonters install roughly 1,300 heat pumps.
