The European Heat Pump Association has identified skills development and demands as being critical within the EU market if the target of the REPowerEU of 2 million heat pumps/year in the next 5 years, reaching a total of 30 million new installations by 2030 can be achieved. With its million direct and indirect jobs, the European heating industry is a force for innovation and local value creation and a continues source for re-skilling and up-skilling of world leading professionals.

Heat Pumps are a critical component for energy security and sustainability, with the need to ensure the development of skills and knowledge on the supply side (manufacturers, designers, installers, commissioners, SMEs) plus the needs on the demand side (building owners, facility managers, property developers) being vital. HP4All addresses this need by aiming to analyse the barriers across the heat pump value chain segments to accurately identify measures, actions and solutions to up-skill the value chain while also driving demand from end-users. Through the piloting of these approaches in countries with emerging heat pump markets, combined with support from technical and HP market expertise the lessons learned can be exploited and spread across Europe.

As such, it becomes quite relevant to look at already running or planned training programmes offered by heat pump manufacturers and associations, while recognising their value and replication potential, with the event presenting a small part of the initiatives that are making a serious change in their countries and at EU level.