Swedish national project

Sweden has one of the largest heat pump markets in Europe (EHPA, 2009). However, the low energy house market is in the introduction phase and therefore, adequate system technologies for low energy houses are still missing on the Swedish national market. A preliminary study of SP has shown that heat pumps are a viable option for low energy houses at the boundary conditions of the Swedish climate and energy prices (Ruud, 2008).
However, marketable components and systems are not adequate for the application in low energy houses and further improvement of system concepts and components is intended in order to reach a high performance for the application. Therefore, product development is needed and consequently, the focus of the Swedish national contribution to Annex 32 is the examination and redesign of Swedish heat pumps for the application in low energy houses. As first step, Sweden therefore made extensive comparison of different system solutions according to changing legal requirements.
An evaluation of different heating systems for low energy houses shows that for the southern Swedish climate, exhaust-air heat pumps are a feasible option, while for the northern Swedish climate ground-coupled systems are the preferred system. Moreover, Sweden has evaluated existing monitoring results of exhaust air and ground-coupled heat pumps which are very popular in Sweden. Field test of three low energy house pilot plants have started in the end of 2009, among other systems a combination of ground-coupled heat pump, but could not be included in the time frame of IEA HPP Annex 32.

The Swedish participation in IEA HPP Annex 32 is supported by the Swedish Energy Agency.