A heat pump uses electricity to pull heat from the air, water, or ground and move it somewhere else, for example into a home that needs warming up. It can move heat in different directions. A refrigerator is a heat pump, as is an air conditioner. A reversible heat pump can warm a building in the winter as well as cool it in the summer.

Building heating and cooling currently accounts for some 15% of energy use around the world. The bulk of that comes from  fossil fuels, including oil, fossil gas (sometimes called ‘natural’ gas), and coal. One benefit of a heat pump is that it is much more efficient than most heat sources: you only have to put in a small amount of energy for it to extract a lot more energy from the air, water or ground. The other benefit is that it can run off electricity, which can be generated by renewable energy sources - unlike gas stoves, which are tied to a fossil fuel source. 

Heat pumps are already being used in many places around the world. They aren’t cheap in all countries yet because they are a relatively new technology, but they can pay for themselves quickly through savings on fuel costs. They also are fairly easy to install.

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• Electric heat pumps use much less energy than furnaces, and can cool houses too – here’s how they work (The Conversation)

• Heat Pump (Wikipedia)

• High-Efficiency Heat Pumps (Project Drawdown)

• The Future of Heat Pumps (International Energy Agency, IEA)

• 10 heat pump myths busted (Jan Rosenow, Twitter)

• If your employer is planning to construct or upgrade buildings, introduce and encourage the use of heat pumps to keep it comfortable indoors.

• Switch to a high-efficiency heat pump to heat and cool your home.