Cite report
IEA (2024), The Future of Heat Pumps in China, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/the-future-of-heat-pumps-in-china, Licence: CC BY 4.0
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Schematic: Heat pump types and applications
Heat pump types and applications
Heat pump taxonomy in this report
Heat pumps in buildings
This category includes heat pumps that deliver heat directly to households and residential or commercial buildings for space heating and/or domestic hot water provision. It includes natural source heat pumps, including reversible air conditioners used as primary heating equipment. It excludes reversible air conditioners used only for cooling, or used as a complement to other heating equipment, such as a boiler.
|
Typical size |
Equipment (electric-based heat pumps based on vapor compression) |
Applicability |
|---|---|---|
|
< 10 kW |
|
Individual households, small residential and commercial buildings, individual rooms. |
|
10-50 kW |
|
Individual households, multi-family buildings and services buildings. |
|
> 50 kW |
|
Multi-family buildings and services buildings. |
Heat pumps in district heating networks
This category includes heat pumps connected to district heat networks, including those in heat substations.
|
Typical size |
Temperature range |
Equipment |
Applicability |
|---|---|---|---|
|
> 100 kW |
70 - 120 °C (primary) 40 - 60 °C (secondary) |
|
Temperature lift in the primary and secondary network. Reduction of return temperature in the primary network. |
Heat pumps in industry
This category includes heat pumps that deliver heat directly to an industrial process. It includes heat pumps with a temperature range of up to 200 °C, and excludes mechanical vapour recompression.
|
Temperature range |
Equipment |
Applicability |
|---|---|---|
|
< 100 °C |
Large-scale heat pumps, particularly to integrate waste heat. |
Industrial processes such as pasteurisation, boiling or bio-reactions. |
|
100 - 200 °C |
Large-scale heat pumps, particularly to integrate waste heat. |
Industrial processes such as drying, distillation or steam production. |