TECH Clean California Supports Manufacturers Committed to New Heat Pump Technology and Capacity Goals

October 25, 2023, Oakland, CA

At the Building Electrification Summit hosted by the California Energy Commission (CEC) and EPRI earlier this month, ten of the world’s largest manufacturers, distributors, and suppliers of building heating and cooling equipment signed an agreement committing to actions aimed at achieving California’s goal to have six million electric heat pumps installed by 2030.

The manufacturers signing the commitment include A. O. Smith Corporation, Carrier, Daikin, Fujitsu, Johnson Controls, Lennox International, LG Electronics, Mitsubishi Electric Trane HVAC US, Rheem Manufacturing Company, and Trane Technologies.

As part of the commitment, the manufacturers agreed to:

  • create the manufacturing capacity to help achieve the state’s goal of installing six million heat pumps by 2030
  • ensure heat pumps are good citizens of the electric grid by enhancing efficiency and incorporating load flexibility, and
  • collaborate with the CEC to develop a public-private partnership to facilitate policy and market support to bring heat pumps into the mainstream.

This new public private partnership will act as a convening body with a focus on consumer awareness, performance, efficiency, contractor training, product availability, load flexibility, data, financing, equity, and more.

TECH Clean California is here to help the partnership reach its goals, and to deliver on its own goal to accelerate the adoption of clean space and water heating technology in California homes -- enabling carbon-free homes by 2045. As the state’s flagship heat pump market transformation initiative, we pledge our support to this commitment and to building electrification at large through our existing efforts:

  • Project Installations: To date, the program has incentivized over 16,000 heat pump projects and continues to provide incentives.
  • Data Analysis: The cornerstone of the TECH Clean California market transformation vision is to gather and publish data on the heat pump water heating (HPWH) and heat pump heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HP HVAC) markets in California. Our interactive website provides access to data gathered by the TECH implementation and evaluation teams. Future meter-based energy savings data as we begin to publish this in 2024.
  • Consumer Awareness: Partnering with the Switch Is On, we’re creating consumer awareness through targeted marketing to consumers about the benefits of switching to electric.
  • Finance: TECH Clean California incentives helped to increase the number of contractors applying for GoGreen Home loans by 200 percent since 2021.
  • Equity: We are committed to meeting our goal of providing 40 percent of incentives to benefit equity customers.
  • Workforce Education and Training: TECH Clean California leads various activities to increase workforce knowledge, skills, and abilities of heat pump technologies, build greater capacity and capability of the workforce to be aptly prepared to transact with the equipment, and to improve employment opportunities.

Our dataset -- posted publicly on our Public Data page -- will continue to inform and guide California's building decarbonization policy, program design, and heat pump investments moving forward.

Electrifying California’s homes will require collaborative efforts from a wide range of stakeholders, and we are excited to provide insights and analysis that help enable this transition.

TECH Clean California is a statewide initiative to accelerate the adoption of clean space and water heating technology across California homes, The initiative provides market incentives and workforce education and training to make it easier for distributors and contractors to stock, sell, and install low-emissions heat pump technology for residential replacement projects. TECH Clean California was designed to support both existing programs through matched incentive funding and to extend statewide incentives emphasizing access for low-income and disadvantaged communities. To find out more, email TECH.info@energy-solution.com.