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Heat pumps are mechanical devices or machines that are used for either heating or cooling, by transferring thermal energy from one location to the other. The first location is called the source and has a lower temperature than the destination location, which is also known as the heat sink or simply, the sink. The particularity of a heat pump is that it moves the thermal energy in an opposite direction to the regular flow. Some of the most recognizable types of heat pumps are probably the freezers or the air conditioning devices that work on compressor-driven air conditioners, but there are actually many types of such pumps. The process undertaken by the heat pump, that of thermal energy transfer, is accomplished through thermodynamics, as it is a known fact that heat can not travel from cold to hot, so the energy is turned from thermal to another type, before ending in the sink, as heat. The different types of heat pumps are strongly connected with the specific use that they are intended. As mentioned before, heat pumps, or varmepumper, can be used for both heating or cooling, according to the status of the environment in comparison with the conditioned-space, although the refrigeration-type cycle is still used in both cases. When they are used for heating purposes, heat pumps can use either air as source, becoming luft til luft varmepumper (air to air heat pumps) or luft til vand varmepumper (air to water heat pumps), or the ground, becoming jordvarme pumper (geothermal pumps). The main reason for heat pumps usage is the fact that they do not demand such a great input from a commercial-energy source as, let's say, electricity does, which is a newly-creating thermal energy method or as gas flames do, which are low-entropy sources of energy. There are two main types of heat pumps, the ones that use compression and the ones that use absorption. The significant difference between them lies in the way their operation source, as compression heat pumps work on mechanical energy, usually electricity, while absorption heat pumps can operate on both electricity and heat energy sources, such as burnable fuels. Depending on these heat energy sources, there are, yet again, several types of heat pumps. For instance, pumps that extract heat from the outside air are known as air source heat pumps and can be divided in air-air heat pumps, or luft til luft varmepumper, which transfers heat from outside to inside air, and air-water heat pumps, or luft til vand varmepumper, which move the heat to a circuit and a tank of hot water. Exhaust air heat pumps use the exhaust air within a building and need mechanical ventilation, while geothermal heat pumps, or jordvarme pumper, use the ground as a source of heat and can be geothermal-air heat pumps, geothermal-water heat pumps or hybrid, using twin sources. The geothermal-air heat pumps are of three kinds, ground-air, rock-air and water-air, just like geothermal-water ones, which can be ground-water, rock-water or water-water heat pumps. For more resources regarding jordvarme pumper or even about luft til luft varmepumper and especially about luft til vand varmepumper please review these pages.
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