E-mail Sherry Listgarten About this blog: Climate change, despite its outsized impact on the planet, is still an abstract concept to many of us. That needs to change. My hope is that readers of this blog will develop a better understanding of how our climate is evolving a...  (More) About this blog: Climate change, despite its outsized impact on the planet, is still an abstract concept to many of us. That needs to change. My hope is that readers of this blog will develop a better understanding of how our climate is evolving and how they want to respond, and will feel comfortable asking questions and exchanging comments on the topic. It is important that we develop a shared understanding of the basic science and impacts of climate change, to make sense of our actions and policy options going forward. My background is not in climate science, and I'm not even particularly green; my hope is that helps to make this blog more relatable. I studied math and neurobiology on the east coast before moving out here in 1987 for grad school in computer science. After working in the tech industry for about 25 years, I retired a few years ago to better align my time with my priorities. I love spending time outdoors, and feel deeply our responsibility to this incredible planet that we call home.  (Hide)

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I really appreciate your detailed reporting on this real-life example. I know several of the people you quoted in the article and I respect their expertise. I also really liked your "Notes and references." Really, you did a great job researching this!

Have you thought about opening your own plumbing business and see if you can drive down the costs? It is very easy to sit on the side lines and complain about how everyone is running their own business. For example, open a store and stock the 15 amp heat pump models and see if you start a market for them. /marc

Great article. Thanks for mentioning nonprofit SunWork. Expanding on our success installing over 1000 solar systems in the Bay Area, SunWork just started our Early Adopter Program for people looking to move from a gas water heater to an efficient heat pump water heater. We follow several of the suggestions in the article to make heat pump water heater affordable. For example, we break out the cost of materials vs labor. We don't have an uplift on the cost of materials. Our pricing is transparent and consistent. We focus on the 15 Amp heat pump models. We do both the electrical work as well as the plumbing. We also collect the rebate directly to lower the out of pocket. The way we have structured the program, the cost before rebates is targeted to be $4700 including a $300 permit for an 80 gallon heat pump water heater. You can check out financial examples at our web site Web Link . We do have some qualification criteria for the program. We focus non emergency installations and only when the water heater is currently in the garage along with a service panel that has room for a 240V breaker. There are a couple additional criteria to streamline the process. As with our solar model, we have volunteers that help with the installations. This helps keep costs down and allows volunteers the opportunity to gain installation experience. Our next volunteer training is October 23. It's online. You can register at Web Link . With the planet heating up, every step to reduce our carbon footprint is important. We offer home owners and volunteers an opportunity to help the Bay Area move in that direction.

First I've heard that expansion tanks are required only when backflow preventers are present. (Every water-heater installation I've been involved with since 1988 either used an existing expansion tank or added one.) My current house was required to have backflow preventers, so perhaps plumbers nowadays just assume that possibility has to be covered. If your parents' house had been in Palo Alto, I might have wondered about the preferences of the inspector, too.

@Mike, thanks for providing all of that information. I am really excited about SunWork's help. @Marc, yes, I understand that this blog can read like armchair plumbing, and I apologize if it does. FWIW, I think the right approach to getting the right equipment is (a) plumbers want to install the right equipment; and (b) they ask the existing supply stores to stock it. My hvac guy said he spent 30 minutes at Standard Plumbing Supply (or PACE, I forget, maybe both) trying to convince them that they need to stock 15-amp larger tanks. If others do that too, problem solved. Thanks for the helpful/interesting comments.

It's expensive to install, costs the same to operate, has worse reheating performance, and requires installation and permitting hassle? Sounds wonderful and like something our local city councils should require [rolls eyes]

@Joseph, thank you for weighing in on this. Here is my version of your version :) For most single-family homes: - A HPWH is similar in cost to install and operate (with the rebate) - It will save more money over its lifetime as gas prices go up relative to electricity - It has the capacity and reheating performance needed - It installs in a day and as a bonus - It is an important step in reducing our building emissions I think that "most" is an important word. It's not "all". But it's also not "some". I think that we should quantify it. Here is the way that I think about it. (1) I don't think global warming is going away in the next ten years (life of a water heater). Instead, it's going to get worse. (2) Because of that, I think gas and oil prices will go up relative to electricity prices. Banks and governments know that fuel switching is cheaper than adaptation, though at this point we have to do both. (3) Given a mostly equal choice between a gas appliance and an electric appliance, I will take electric *every time* from here on out. (4) In most cases, these hybrid water heaters meet that test, though we have to keep pushing on cost and installation time/complexity (cf this blog post), as well as understand the exceptions. I expect that all of this would be a lot easier if our local energy providers would send a strong signal on energy pricing. I hope that they can do that, but I understand also that utilities have restrictions on pricing that are frustrating their efforts. Maybe you can help them out there :)

Let's be honest. Electricity always has and always will be more expensive than gas. Our home in Palo Alto is all electric, and so is our home in Contra Costa County. It has nothing to do with anyone's political agenda, climate change, etc. and I would never cave into someone else's desire as to "gas or electricity" in my home. Unless you're making the mortgage payments and paying the property taxes. [Portion removed] We're all entitled to our views, but that's what voting is for. Democracy -- not trying to control others. Gas or electricity is a personal choice.

> Let's be honest. Electricity always has and always will be more expensive than gas. I don't really understand this comment. You mean on a per-unit-of-energy basis? Our homes don't use electricity or gas on their own, there's an appliance involved. Many electric appliances are already cheaper to operate than their gas counterparts. > Gas or electricity is a personal choice. I appreciate that this succinct statement is very "of the times".

Complicating the underlying wild swings in the price of gas on a decadal basis are the substantial political influences affecting especially the price of electricity. Because of that, I don't see any measure of global warming determining the relative cost of gas vs. electricity -- just politics. Perhaps an investment bank can develop gas vs. electricity futures hedges to sell people so they can have predictability on this.

I look forward to replacing my gas water heater with an energy efficient electric one in the future, but it's not my most pressing goal. I've analyzed how much gas my 38 gallon gas water consumes annually and it isn't very much, about 5-7 therms per month and I wonder how much of that is keeping the pilot light lit. In contrast my gas heating furnace burned 2 to 3 times as much gas each Winter, I say 'burned' because two Winters ago, I shut it off and never turned it back ON. Instead, I use electric space heaters which I know aren't the most efficient way to heat, but my solar panels produce enough surplus energy that using them doesn't cost me anything. I'm all for going ALL electric but I think I'll wait until my gas water heater is past its warranty before I replace it. Hopefully, more affordable installations will be available by then, or I'll just do it myself. In the mean time, I look forward to installing a more efficient space heating appliance such as a mini-split. Here in the city of Santa Clara, the city rebate for a Heat Pump Water Heater is only available if you switch out an electric model. When will they see the light?

I am the elderly parent. Looks like SunWork is the way to go in light of our experience. Their business model looks great. We are so pleased with our HPWH and are now looking into a heat pump to replace our aging furnace. More importantly, we are trying to get our neighbors interested as well.

I had a heat pump water heater installed by a person you named in your article, and his fee was quite a bit less than what your parents were quoted. I am also fortunate that in Los Altos the permit fee is minimal, under $100. I got a great rebate from Silicon Valley Green Energy too. I am very happy to reduce my gas use in such a simple and cost effective way!

@Marc We have a tankless gas water heater. It's much smaller than a water heater with a tank, and won't fall over in an earthquake (but also doesn't store an emergency water supply). The 2 of us use about 1 - 2 therms / month for water heating. As you point out, it's small compared to the furnace. Energy efficiency should be the primary goal, then "green" energy. Our "carbon free" electricity isn't actually carbon-free. Offsets (like planting forests that can burn down) are purchased using offsets. And, for solar to work at night, battery storage is needed.

I keep seeing this sort of comment "any hum wouldn't be a problem". Just how much noise does this sort of water heater make? It's not enough to dismiss the noise as "negligible" or "it doesn't matter to me so let's not talk about it". We don't all have the luxury of a floor plan or building where we can isolate noise making appliances. For those us that are disturbed by the constant cycling, humming, whistling, and incessant background noise of transformers, fans, compressors, motors, etc. this is a real consideration and a solid advantage to existing gas appliances.

Hi Sherry, another great article. (We spoke earlier in year about your HP articles and electricity costs to help inform SV2 background.) I believe contractors add $ to the estimate because of our area (PA, Menlo, PV, etc.) In March 2020 my gas WH died, and couldn't wait for a HP to be installed. I priced gas WH at Home Depot, then arranged an install through Home Depot. The contractor came - estimate was $2900 (!). Last WH in 2008 was ~ $900 installed. When questioning the person giving the estimate, he quoted the price of the WH about $350 MORE than it's cost at HD. He disagreed, so we looked at HD web page - and he shrugged. I told him it was too much $ - he left and said his manager would call. On that call the manager asked "well how much do you want to pay?" I got him down to $2000 (!) How many people know to negotiate? People are in a jam with no hot water, and I am disappointed (and no longer naive) with HD and that contractor.

Thank you for a thorough article on the costs of this Heat Pump Water Heater. I am now convinced more than ever not to go in this direction just to "feel good about doing my bit for the environment." Should my five year old 50 gallon gas water heater -- which was around $1000 with installation -- fail, I will likely still replace it with the traditional gas heater. Electricity does not heat water nearly as efficiently, let alone our problems with a reliable source of it. My hot water bill is negligible; I wash clothes in unheated water and have a high efficiency dishwasher. The cost of this type of heater, with labor, permits and the unit itself is staggering. It is a very poor return on investment, even with the rebate. It would take years to recoup the expense, even in a home with a higher usage. A better bang for the buck to curb gas emissions would be to curtail cars idling in parking lots while owners check their cell phones.

Our gas water heater died a year ago. I immediately contacted one of my green friends who contacted someone else who recommended a contractor who would put in a “bridge" heat pump water heater while ours was ordered, permitted and installed. The quote was $5,750 with permit and about $800 less if we skipped the City of Palo Alto permitting (which is why I'm not naming the contractor). We winced at the expense but we wanted hot water sooner rather than later so we didn't shop around. The “bridge" was installed promptly. The contractor ordered the new unit and obtained the City permit. “Our" water heater took maybe a couple of months to arrive but it didn't matter because we had hot water in the mean time. The contractor installed and later deinstalled the “bridge" heater and installed the new water heater. The new heater installation passed the City inspection and few months later we received our $1,200 rebate. We have plenty of hot water for our family of three and a cool garage during the hot summer days.

My experience with the rebate program: First, I did some research and learned that a 50 gallon HPWH costs $1700 or less at Home Depot. Then I contacted four plumbers on BayRen's approved list. Only two responded. The high bid was $6165. The quote did not itemize parts and labor, but I was told verbally that parts were $3000! The low bid was $5200, again without itemized parts and labor. The parts charge seems very high. I would expect that a plumber would not have to pay retail prices. Labor seems very high, considering that I had my house completely repiped for $5211, a much bigger job than connecting two pipes to a water heater. Electrical work was minimal, as I already had 240v wiring in the garage. At that point I said, "Forget it."

Thanks for the comments! A couple of factual points... - The local power providers do not purchase offsets for clean electricity. They do purchase resources that work at night, like wind, geothermal, hydro, and batteries. - Tank water heaters are strapped so that they do not fall down in an earthquake. - Typical hot water usage in this area is 10-15 therms/month. One-third of your annual use is a reasonable estimate. Although space heating uses much more in winter, it uses much less in other seasons. - Heat pump water heaters in Palo Alto cost a few hundred dollars less to operate at today's rates. (Palo Alto has much lower rates than PG&E, though no time-of-use rates yet.) I expect that operational savings will improve further as time-of-use rates roll out and/or as people adopt solar roofs. I think it's also very likely that gas rates will increase relative to electricity over the life of the heater. - I'd characterize the hum as being like a refrigerator or fan. But best if you can visit one yourself at a home near you.

@Robert: Ugh, thanks for sharing, and yes, it's frustrating! Of the BayREN contractors, Air & Plumbing Systems seems to have pretty consistently fair prices, and soon SunWork will be up and running. Some installation choices will run up the cost, like an expansion tank, rigid copper piping (very pricy these days), a mixing valve, etc. A contractor who wants to do a less expensive job usually has other options. For example, an hvac guy I spoke with who does these pretty quickly said he uses flexible stainless pipes, which are cheaper and easier to work with. Re labor, in addition to placement/piping/strapping/testing there is often duct work, electrical work, condensation routing, capping off of gas, disposing of the old tank, maybe a return visit. I'd guess 8-10 hours for a vanilla installation by someone with experience doing these. On top of that there's a permit fee and time for processing that. So the city needs to reduce overhead and cost, but contractors also need to offer fairer pricing imo (as some already do). We shouldn't have people giving up like you had to.

Why mess around with marginal decreases in carbon emissions in a city that intends to increase its residential population by 40-50%? Mountain View is about GROWTH and therefore a larger impact on the planet. Keeping gas appliances diversifies our energy sources. This seems an important advantage given our experiences with energy markets in the past. Having more of our energy coming from electricity makes our allergy to nukes seem to be inadvisable.

Thank you Sherry for another thorough and thoughtful article. We live in an older house in downtown Palo Alto. Our water heater is in the (tiny) basement, accessible only via a ladder and small trapdoor. Our electrical panel is near capacity. I imagine that any heat pump installation there would be very expensive (although I have not checked this out). What I do know, is that I am getting old, and when our house is sold it is likely to be scraped. It seems to me a very expensive way to achieve clean energy goals. Mandating these devices in new construction makes a lot more sense than requiring retrofits.

Sherry: your problem, like most people that know nothing about construction or the trades, is you assume the work was no big deal, a "vanilla installation". Clearly it wasn't or they wouldn't have put in 22 hours getting the work done. It is often much more complicated than the non-tradesperson assumes. I've been managing construction for over 28 years and dealing with the costs of "green" construction. It ALL costs more than conventional construction. Some of it has financial benefits that will eventually pay for the added expense, but much of it either doesn't or takes so long to pay for itself it's not an expense many are willing to bear. That's the reason there are government subsidies for a lot of it. Without them the cost is out of reach.

The last time I had my gas water heater replaced (2015) the unit itself was under warranty because it failed in under 10 years. Time in: 10:30, time out 13:35. 1 person, 3 hours @ $98/hr. So, total labor $294. BTW -- By 2015 Rheem had figured out that their heaters weren't lasting 10 years, and reduced their warranty period to 6 years. I wonder how long the warranty is on the HPHW, whether they tend to fail inside the warranty period, and how much the plumbers will be charging to do a like-for-like replacement.

Postscript to my previous comment: The gas water heater replacement before the 2015 one was in 2006, and cost a total of $390 in parts and labor because it needed upgraded earthquake strapping and modified overflow piping. The unit itself was under warranty, and so zero additional cost to me.

@NB: You could look it up, but to save you the time, the warranty on Rheem hybrid water heaters is 10 years plus 1-year in-home labor. A friend of my talked with a Rheem rep who assured him the tank will go before the heat pump. So the $20 anode rod may be a good investment for another 10 years. I would expect replacement labor after that to be relatively low since the fittings are all in the right places and the electric work is done. Plus you don't have to worry about gas leaks. A gas tank water heater these days costs, what, $1200 to buy and install, not including permit. The hybrid costs much more, say $4000 even with SunWork. The rebate and operating costs should make up most of the difference when we are aiming for widespread adoption. For now, a good number of people are happy to pay a little extra to reduce their home emissions by one-third. Maybe your point is that Rheem needs to be designing water heaters to be maintainable? Sure thing.

Thanks for your post, Sherry! Our household switched from a very inefficient gas furnace to a heat pump some years ago and from a gas tank water heater to a heat pump water heater a couple of months ago. We are very happy with our changes. We are saving on our house heating, we don't use gas, and the electrical bill for all our use is roughly the same as before. I'd recommend anybody upgrading their heating system to look into a heat pump. They are silent, efficient, and don't move air around so they are good for people with allergies. Our experience with the Heat Pump Water Heater (HPWH) has also been very good, but there are some possible obstacles to the adoption of HPWH in California. I think the main two are (1) the need for a 220V/30A outlet, and (2) some noise. None of these were real issues in our case but they may be in some cases, and I believe we (CA in general, the BA Counties, and MPk in particular) have some influence to address them. We have Rheem Hybrid. The model comes in 30A and 15A, both 220V, but only the 30A is readily available. These hybrid units have a resistor and a heat pump. The 220V is needed for the resistor but not for the Heat Pump. We only use the unit in Heat Pump mode, which is *very* efficient. Heat Pumps have compressors, same setup as a refrigerator. Modrn refrigerators use linear / inverter compressors which are move efficient and quiet than the best HPWH in California (the Rheem / Ruud products). These two characteristics (220V outlet & noise) can complicate the installation of HPWH. Appliance manufacturers have better models available in other markets; if they were to bring them to California we would simplify the adoption of HPWH, and we (citizens, cities, counties) can help that happen.

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