The demand for heat pumps made more affordable through provincial and federal rebate programs has skyrocketed.
“Very busy, very high demand. A lot of customers are getting these,” said Aaron Sevigny, sales at Victoria’s Refrigerative Supply, as he helped load boxes into a waiting vehicle.
“We see it, we deal with a lot of the different contractors around town. And there’ve been more and more companies growing.”
That’s another load of heat pumps leaving the warehouse. But now, part of the program has suddenly ended.
Many contractors, like Chris Bridgeman, owner of Bridgeman Heating and Plumbing, only found out late last week.
“We heard on Friday morning at nine o’clock that it was only going to be going until Monday, today at one o’clock,” Bridgeman told CHEK News.
He started installing heat pumps 30 years ago and says the rebate programs are a success.
“It’s been a bit of a scramble,” he said. “A lot of people who were on the fence deciding whether they were going to do the program have now got on theirs.”
According to Sean Hutchinson with Temp Tech Mechanical Ltd., panic buying started when the news started to filter out that the federal rebates were ending.
“The last few weeks have definitely been crazy,” he said. “Everyone is trying to get in at the last second there. Some people thought the rebates were going to keep going.”
Until Monday afternoon, the provincial government contributed up to $3,000 from Clean BC and BC Hydro, totalling $6,000.
Combined with $5,000 from the federal government, that’s $11,000.
But the federal program ended Monday.
So now, heat pump rebates have dropped to a maximum of $6,000. More than 550,000 applied for the federal rebate since it launched.
Now that’s ended, Hutchinson said there is hope that another program may be around the corner.
“There is rumblings that there could potentially be other incentives or rebates,” he said. “No one really knows the correct amount.”
With impending federal and provincial elections, rebates may become an election issue as interest in greener energy continues to grow.
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Mary Griffin
