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| − | {{comic
| + | This comic- |
| − | | number = 3099
| + | ERROR$#.?* XKCD NOT FOUND$^&&//:; D!;GE%&&@, R&N NO& A%&D*^T L&:" $*( |
| − | | date = June 6, 2025
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| − | | title = Neighbor-Source Heat Pump
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| − | | image = neighbor_source_heat_pump_2x.png
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| − | | imagesize = 431x284px
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| − | | noexpand = true
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| − | | titletext = The installation of the pipes on the inside of the insulation can be challenging, especially when the neighbor could come home at any minute.
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| − | }}
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| − | ==Explanation==
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| − | {{incomplete|This page was created by A HOT-TEMPERED NEIGHBOUR. Don't remove this notice too soon.}}
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| − | Using electricity to heat the home used to involve direct use of {{w|Joule heating|resistive heating}}, as an alternative to burning fuel of some sort, but more recently both this and the fuel-burning boiler have started to be replaced (or sometimes augmented) by developments in heat-pump technology which, much like the operation of a typical refrigerator, use a relatively small amount of power to move heat to where it is most needed (away from where the heat is ''not'' required). This is most commonly and conveniently done using an {{w|air source heat pump}} installed on the outside wall of the building/apartment, which can extract heat from the ambient outside air and use that to heat the inside of the household, and often also maintain its hot-water supply. Because of the varying nature of the external climate, this is less efficient (or at least more technically difficult) in colder weather, the time when the heating would be most appreciated. (The biggest problem being that trying to extract heat from air close to the freezing point of water, or below, will tend to condense out and freeze any moisture in the air, upon the external components, reducing the ability to extract heat from the air, a problem that might be solved by temporarily sending heat outwards to defrost the heatsink pipework.)
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| − | An alternate method of harvesting heat is the {{w|ground source heat pump}}. This does the same job of extracting heat energy from ''its'' surroundings (pipes sent deep into the ground, rather than just being exposed to the air by the side of the building), and benefits from the more constant temperature of the pedosphere (or deeper) which is often deeper than the [[402: 1,000 Miles North|frost-line]], always giving a ''relatively'' warm heat-source, to extract energy from, even in the depths of winter. If set up to also cool a home, in warm conditions, it also finds the same reliably small range of ground-temperatures useful in being ''cooler'' than the ambient air of summer, thus being more suited to disperse excess heat into whilst cooling the indoors environment. A further method, the water source heat pump, similarly makes use of a sufficiently large body of water's tendency to provide a near constant 4°C temperature (whatever the external conditions) in its depths.
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| − | In this comic, [[Randall]] goes further and finds a handy source of heat (in winter) and cold (in summer)… the house of a neighbor, which is itself being actively maintained (perhaps by more traditional heating and cooling technology) at a temperature which approaches his own preference for temperature. Being thermally inverted to the current seasonal conditions, it would be even more economical to tap into for heat during cold times and coolness during the warmer ones. At least it would be for Randall, not the neighbor who is now forced to effectively air-condition ''two'' buildings, instead of the one they thought they were maintaining. This is accomplished by sending the pipes (that ''might'' have been just buried in the ground) from the heat-exchange unit off into the walls of the neighbouring house to tap into the artificially-maintained temperature there.
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| − | The title text addresses some of the issues involved when trying to properly install the Neighbor-Source Heat Pump, without the neighbor realising that they are about to be leeched from in this way. It may already be quite difficult to interfere with the structure of the neighbouring house (in this case, by feeding pipes up into at least two of its wall cavities) without this being noticed once the absent neighbour returns, but to do so under the imminent risk of being observed at work by the neighbour arriving home would take [[666: Silent Hammer|even more care]] to accomplish.
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| − | While the small-scale application suggested here can thus be assumed to cause neighborly trouble, this concept has been in use on much larger scales for about the last ten years with virtually no repercussions - which is largely due to [https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200908-the-buildings-warmed-by-the-human-body the tapped neighboring premises not being residential buildings]. On top of this, {{w|district heating}}, or "neighborhood heating" is a real system where a centralized heat source provides heating for multiple buildings in the neighborhood, either through a dedicated heat source (created to exploit the economies of scale) just for this purpose, or else taking waste heat from some other local amenity (e.g. a waste incinerator) that is producing sufficient quantities to spare as a side-effect of its core operation. This is humorously in contrast to to the comic where someone steals heat from one of their neighbours as one might {{w|Cable television piracy|steal Cable TV}}.
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| − | ==Transcript==
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| − | :[Two houses are shown next to each other. They have almost identical facades with a base, two windows on either side of a door and a chimney to the right on the roof. But next to the left house there is a small box with two light-blue pipes going from the house to the box. From the bottom of the box two similar light-blue pipes goes a bit down under ground, the left further than the right, and then they bend to the right and goes under the neighboring house to the right. The upper pipe closest to the ground is shown to enter the wall of the right house, going almost up to the roof, and then bending sharply around going down below ground. Then it goes under ground to the other side of the house and do the same in the right wall, going up and down. Where it goes under ground, it connects to the the other pipe that has gone all the way straight under the house.]
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| − | :[Caption below the panel:]
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| − | :A covertly-installed '''''Neighbor-Source Heat Pump''''' takes advantage of the fact that your neighbor keeps their house cool in the summer and warm in the winter.
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| − | {{comic discussion}}<noinclude>
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| − | [[Category:Comics with color]]
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| − | [[Category:Physics]]
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