Jennifer and Eric Mauchan live in a Cape Cod-style house in Framingham, Massachusetts, which they cool with five air conditioners. In the summer months, the electricity bill for a 2,600 square meter house can reach $200.
In the winter, natural gas heating often costs more than $300 a month, even if the temperature is set at 65 degrees Fahrenheit (18 degrees Celsius).
“When my mother was alive, she wouldn’t come to our house in the winter because it was too cold,” Eric Mauchan said.
But starting Tuesday, the neighborhoods will be part of a pilot climate solution that connects 37 homes and businesses with a highly efficient, underground heating and cooling system. Even considering that many buildings will switch from natural gas to electricity, people’s electricity bills are expected to decrease by an average of 20 percent. It’s a model that some experts say could be scaled up and replicated elsewhere.
“As soon as they told me that, I was 100% bought in,” said Jennifer Mauchan, who works in finance, recalling her first meeting with representatives from Eversource, the gas and electric utility that installed the system. “From a financial standpoint, I thought this was a very viable option for us.” In the decision, she stated that reducing greenhouse gases that cause climate change is an important factor.
Gina Richard, owner of Corner Cabinet, a kitchen and bathroom cabinet showroom in Framingham, said she feels “pretty lucky” to be a part of the project. He currently uses two air conditioners and two heaters and is looking forward to replacing them all with one. Richard said he had been told his $900-$1,000 winter heating bill could be reduced by a third, which would be “incredible”.
The Framingham system consists of a giant underground loop filled with water and antifreeze, similar to how gas is distributed to many homes in the neighborhood. The water in the loop absorbs heat from underground, which stays at about 55 degrees Fahrenheit (13 degrees Celsius) all year long.
Households have their own heat pump units that provide heating and air conditioning, installed by the utility. These take heat from the cycle, increase the temperature even more, and release this heat into homes as hot air. For air conditioning, heat is taken from the home or workplace and released to the Earth or transported to the next home.
Energy sharing works best when some buildings benefit from heat while others need it; just like a grocery store must keep its cases refrigerated even during the winter months.
There are other networked geothermal projects in the US, including the Texas community of Whisper Valley and Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. Eversource says this is the first utility-focused installation in the United States. This could be important if it works because an individual homeowner cannot do the digging and drilling required to create a neighborhood system.
Currently, homeowners can purchase individual air source heat pumps, which are becoming more common and efficient. Or they might drill for more expensive, or even more efficient, ground source heat pumps. Incentives like the Inflation Reduction Act or local utilities help lower their prices, but the final cost can still be tens of thousands of dollars.
Framingham beat out other communities that applied to Eversource to become a pilot site. The city, 20 minutes west of Boston, is surrounded by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as well as companies such as Thermo Fisher Scientific, Pfizer and Novartis. Eric Mauchan said the proximity of such advanced technology and a state law requiring greenhouse gas emissions to be reduced to zero by 2050 have helped make society receptive.
Eversource’s vice president of clean technologies, Nikki Bruno, also cited the state’s emissions law as the reason for the pilot. It’s also “an opportunity for decarbonization,” She said, because Eversource has its own net-zero goal.
“We’re thinking right now, okay, we’re doing this pilot now, how can we scale this into a sustainable business model, a sustainable program that we can offer in more locations?” said.
Jack DiEnna, founder of the Geothermal National and International Initiative, an alliance of industry professionals, said utilities are seeing pressure to address climate change and incentives to do so. Ground source heat pumps are highly efficient, reduce electricity demand on the grid, and can be installed in areas where gas lines cannot reach. They also cool homes and cause very little climate pollution compared to traditional heaters and air conditioners.
There is also an equity issue that concerns some in the climate and energy sector. Cutting off natural gas by those who can afford it may have unequal consequences for people.
“This means that people who can’t afford it are having to pay for this gas system, this very leaky gas system,” said Ania Camargo, thermal energy networks manager for the Building Decarbonization Coalition, a nonprofit organization working to eliminate fossil fuels from buildings.
“One of the reasons I advocate for utilities to be a big part of the solution is that there is a way to make sure we can do this for everyone.”
Returning to the Mauchan family home, the couple laughs about the changes they made to their old heating system. “I was so mindful of the expense we would incur if we turned the temperature up to, God forbid, 70 degrees in the winter,” Jennifer explained about letting the house cool in the winter.
They expect new heat pumps to change things. “So, we’re going to keep our house 71 degrees all year long,” Eric said.
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