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Throughline · Emerging technologies

From one install to a national market

I first worked with commercial heat pump water heaters as an owner, on one of Washington's first CO₂ installations. Over the next seven years, I worked on the same technology through codes, load management, utility programs, and the manufacturer specifications that decide what gets built. Ecotope's engineers did the performance modeling; I handled the policy, program, and convening work.

  1. OWNER · PIERCE COUNTY

  2. 2017

    One of Washington's first CO₂ installations

    At the Soundview Building, a CO₂ heat pump water heater with pipe insulation, a high-efficiency circulation pump, and low-flow aerators cut water use 64% year over year and whole-building energy use by about 10%, with a payback under two years.

  3. 2017–2019

    Pilots across the portfolio

    At the County-City Building, I scoped one of the first daisy-chained Sanden CO₂ heat pump water heater systems, and BPA offered a $50,000 grant tied to its field monitoring of the hot water replacement. I worked with BPA, NEEA, and Energy350 on a very high-efficiency DOAS scope for the 950 Fawcett building, and the County piloted heat pump water heaters at the Medical Examiner and Soundview buildings.

  4. CODES AND LOAD · AT ECOTOPE

  5. 2021–2022

    Getting the codes to work

    For BPA's emerging technology program, I co-authored white papers on code enforcement for commercial heat pump water heaters and on plumbing-code barriers, and delivered training for code inspectors and a heat pump water heater workshop for Seattle's permitting department.

  6. 2022

    Load shift and storage

    I led Seattle City Light's Multifamily Load Shift Evaluation, which modeled central heat pump water heaters and EV charging at a 76-unit affordable building under the utility's pilot time-of-day rates and sized the hot water storage needed to shift load out of peak hours.

  7. PROGRAMS · TACOMA POWER AND APPA

  8. 2022–2023

    A model program any public utility can run

    Tacoma Power won an APPA grant to design a national model incentive program for public power utilities, with Ecotope as its consultant. From mid-2022 I led Ecotope's delivery, directing the team that built the Central HPWH Performance and Incentive Tool and screening guidelines, and was lead author of the program guidelines. The program qualifies equipment by performance tier on NEEA's qualified products list rather than through custom modeling. The work fed measure development at the Regional Technical Forum, which previewed the measure in December 2023 and began redefining it as a commissioning protocol in 2025.

  9. MARKET · WHAT GETS BUILT

  10. 2023

    Bringing manufacturers to the table

    After a May 2023 manufacturer roundtable of more than 200 attendees, I coordinated next steps on the RTF measure with NEEA and BPA and presented the tools, program, and engagement landscape at the Consortium for Energy Efficiency's Industry Partners Meeting.

  11. 2023–2024

    A council of competing manufacturers

    With colleagues from Ecotope, BPA, and the New Buildings Institute, I co-founded and co-facilitated the Commercial HPWH Manufacturer's Action Council, supported by the Advanced Water Heating Initiative. Its first meetings agreed a purpose, accelerating the growth of the commercial heat pump water heater market, and an objective of reducing market uncertainty through coordinated research, marketing, standards, and workforce training.

  12. 2024

    Natural refrigerants

    I co-authored BPA's roadmap for overcoming barriers to natural refrigerants in the United States. My involvement ended when I left Ecotope in early 2024.