>heat pumps have significantly increased loads on distribution circuits
I'm not certain how true this is. Heat pumps are still a lot more efficient than traditional A/C for cooling, thus it can be a net new appliance while displacing less efficient AC within the same power envelope. For A/Cs sold within the last decade or so they would hypothetically have a SEER rating of 13-14, and many of the new heat pumps range from 19-20 as a starting point, which is a 38% reduction in electricity usage off the bat.
Using heat pumps for heat as well vs. a fossil fuel admittedly is net new electricity usage, but if it displaces electric resistance space heating that is a major efficiency savings there too.
Notably heat pumps displace load overall and at the times of highest stress (really cold and hot days respectively), so in some ways they are a cost reduction center, not an added stressor to the grid. Trying to shed/shape load around those rare thermal extremes is very expensive and heat pumps actually reduce the grid's struggle in performing during those periods. This is unlike the mode shift from EVs which just as a form of expenditure of energy is strictly additive in shifting from ICE to EV.
At least $43 million in 48C Advanced Energy Project tax credits were awarded to companies investing in various kinds of transformers, including $18m in support of an overall $150m investment by Siemens to begin manufacturing large power transformers in the U.S. for the first time in the company's history. "At least" because companies had to voluntarily self-disclose that they won the allocated credits, due to taxpayer privacy rules. Hard to see how an additional ~$200m in grants (with attendant NEPA requirements, which tax credits don't have) would be massively more...transformative. (Had to, it was right there.)
>heat pumps have significantly increased loads on distribution circuits
I'm not certain how true this is. Heat pumps are still a lot more efficient than traditional A/C for cooling, thus it can be a net new appliance while displacing less efficient AC within the same power envelope. For A/Cs sold within the last decade or so they would hypothetically have a SEER rating of 13-14, and many of the new heat pumps range from 19-20 as a starting point, which is a 38% reduction in electricity usage off the bat.
Using heat pumps for heat as well vs. a fossil fuel admittedly is net new electricity usage, but if it displaces electric resistance space heating that is a major efficiency savings there too.
Notably heat pumps displace load overall and at the times of highest stress (really cold and hot days respectively), so in some ways they are a cost reduction center, not an added stressor to the grid. Trying to shed/shape load around those rare thermal extremes is very expensive and heat pumps actually reduce the grid's struggle in performing during those periods. This is unlike the mode shift from EVs which just as a form of expenditure of energy is strictly additive in shifting from ICE to EV.
At least $43 million in 48C Advanced Energy Project tax credits were awarded to companies investing in various kinds of transformers, including $18m in support of an overall $150m investment by Siemens to begin manufacturing large power transformers in the U.S. for the first time in the company's history. "At least" because companies had to voluntarily self-disclose that they won the allocated credits, due to taxpayer privacy rules. Hard to see how an additional ~$200m in grants (with attendant NEPA requirements, which tax credits don't have) would be massively more...transformative. (Had to, it was right there.)