Few recognize that heat pump technology has been around for nearly two centuries. Fewer still know this technology was invented in large part to improve energy efficiencies and help the planet as part of that deal.
Yes, the very same technology that governments, utilities, and property owners are using to reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions has pretty much been an ecological superpower since the days of our great-great-great-great-grandparents.
During the middle part of the 19th century, huge volumes of salt brine needed to be boiled to produce salt for landlocked nations such as Austria. Because these were the days before fossil fuels and railways, local wood was used for the fires. The result was something of an ecological disaster, because entire forests were felled to boil the water.
Hand-drawn schematic of Rittinger’s heat pump, courtey Polytechnisches Achiv – Berlin.
In 1856 Peter von Rittinger began to tinker with many of the same mechanical principles underlying modern heat pump technology, reducing salt production power requirements by an astounding 80 percent. We picture countless trees silently applauding Rittinger’s efforts. Humans would do some saluting as well, with Rittinger ultimately was knighted for his invention.
Rittinger’s biography, as one writer put it, “reads like a Victorian novel, and his invention was a text-book example of innovation triggered by scarcity.” One wonders what he’d think of his invention’s role today in helping to curb catastrophic climate change. Instead of saving forests, he may be saving humanity itself.
