Editor’s note: The 2026 High-Temperature Heat Pump Symposium, held in January in Copenhagen, brought together more than 530 technology providers, industrial end users, researchers, consultants and policymakers. Phil Morgan, Haskell’s Strategic Industry Advisor for Beer, Wine & Spirits, participated and shares his findings.

Manufacturers looking to reduce purchased energy and operating costs can use high-temperature heat pumps (HTHPs) to recover heat from one process and raise it to a useful temperature for another. The technology is moving into commercial industrial applications, but its value depends on where and how it is integrated.

For HTHPs, that work starts with a facility’s heat sources, heat demands and utility economics, not with a single piece of equipment.

Waste Heat as an Energy Source

Many industrial facilities reject usable thermal energy through refrigeration condensers, compressor cooling water, wastewater streams, condensate and process cooling loops. An HTHP captures heat from one of these sources and raises it to a temperature suitable for hot water, process heating, preheating or, in some applications, steam generation.

Recent advances in compressors, refrigerants, heat exchangers and controls have broadened the technology’s operating range. Commercial systems can produce process heat above 248°F (120°C), while some manufacturers have demonstrated systems approaching 392°F (200°C) for select applications. The appropriate system depends on the source temperature, required output temperature, capacity and process conditions.

Early Engineering Improves Options

HTHPs are not plug-and-play technology. One key factor is temperature lift, the difference between the available heat-source temperature and the required process temperature. As the lift increases, the heat pump generally must do more work, which lowers efficiency and increases electricity use. Reducing the lift can improve performance and operating economics.

That makes conceptual design important. Engineers can map heat sources and sinks, review load profiles, evaluate whether process temperatures can be adjusted and account for electrical infrastructure, utility rates, controls, reliability and future expansion. Considering these variables before major equipment selections are fixed preserves more options and can reduce later modifications.

Evaluate the Whole Thermal System

HTHPs often work best with conventional steam systems, heat recovery, mechanical vapor recompression (MVR) and thermal storage rather than as standalone boiler replacements. MVR recovers energy from vapor streams in distillation and evaporation, while HTHPs can recover lower-grade heat from refrigeration and cooling systems. The technologies can address different parts of the same thermal system.

Facilities with simultaneous heating and cooling demands, including breweries, distilleries, dairies and other food processing operations, may offer particularly useful integration opportunities. Actual value depends on the quantity and timing of available heat, target temperatures, annual operating hours and utility costs.

Thermal storage can also help balance supply and demand. It can store heat when demand is lower and serve peak loads later, allowing an HTHP to operate more steadily and reducing supplemental boiler demand where the system supports that approach.

Haskell’s strategic industry advisors and engineering teams evaluate these factors as part of an integrated thermal plan. Depending on the facility, the appropriate solution may combine an HTHP with MVR, conventional boilers, thermal storage or process changes.

Symposium Insights Inform Decisions

The 2026 symposium reflected a maturing market, with growing commercial deployment alongside continued work on reliability, validation and transparent performance data. Its central lesson for manufacturers is practical: HTHPs are not a universal replacement for conventional heating systems, and equipment performance alone does not determine project value.

Owners should evaluate HTHPs through lifecycle performance, operational flexibility, reliability and economics. A project-specific analysis can determine where recoverable heat is available, which loads it can serve and how the system should integrate with existing and future utilities.

To discuss where HTHPs may fit within a broader thermal strategy, contact Phil Morgan at phillip.morgan@haskell.com.

Read the full white paper for more in-depth guidance and insights from Morgan: High-Temperature Heat Pumps: From Pilot to Process Strategy

About the author: Phil Morgan is Haskell’s Strategic Industry Advisor for Beer, Wine & Spirits, serving as a bridge between client operations and Haskell’s design and construction capabilities. With more than 30 years of experience as a restaurant operator, entrepreneur and hospitality designer, he brings firsthand knowledge of what it takes to build and run facilities where production performance matters. His background, including founding a Brooklyn-based design firm that created 150+ hospitality spaces and deep hands-on work across craft distilleries, gives him the ability to identify operational gaps early and translate client needs into practical design solutions. Phil also serves as a regular spirits judge for the American Craft Spirits Association.