EcoCute surpasses 700,000 units in domestic sales; booming due to replacement demand in FY2022
An annual domestic sales for EcoCute surpasses 700,000 units for the first time in FY2022. It is increased by 15.9% from last year and renewed the past highest record drastically. The prosperity of EcoCute market are expected to be continued for a while by continuation of the replacement demand and acceleration of the dissmination of ZEH(Net Zero Energy House). The total sales volume will be assumed to surpass 9,000,000 units in the first half of the year of FY2023.
Eco-Cute has been widely used in Japan along with the expansion of all-electric houses, due to its high energy-saving performance of heat pump technology. The sales volume has been steadily growing since the full-scale dissemination started in the mid-2000s and reached a record high of 566,000 units in FY2010. However, the situation drastically changed after the Great East Japan Earthquake. The sales pace slowed down and it dropped to the level of 400,000 units in FY2015.
Despite that, the sales recovered and have been surpassing the previous year since FY2016 due to the resumption of all-electric house sales. While the sales were negatively affected by the suspension of construction work due to the COVID-19 pandemic in FY2020, there has been a consistant upward trend.
In recent years, the pace of growth has accelerated, and the market is thriving. According to the statistics released by JRAIA (Japan Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Industry Association) on April 20th, the sales in the FY2022 reached 704,000 units. It surpassed the FY2021, where sales were also strong, reaching over 600,000 units for the first time and increasing by 12.5% from previous year.
The primary factor for the market growth is replacement demand. There are many stocks that have been installed for more than 15 years, exceeding the useful life significantly and its replacement demand resulted in the expansion of the market. It is expected that the stocks in the renewal period will continue to increase.
The promotion to accelerate the ZEH also back up for the increase of replacement demand.
ZEH and Eco-Cute, both of which require high efficiency equipment have high compatibility with each other. In FY2021, Eco-Cute was adopted to approx. 70% of ZEH. The number of ordered detached house adopted with ZEH increases every year. The government set a policy to require energy efficiecy at ZEH standards for newly constructed houses after FY2030. The activities towards ZEH standarnization will be a strong boost to increase the sales of Eco-Cute.
The application for subsidies under the government’s hot-water supply energy-saving project has started at the end of March, with a subsidy of 50,000 yen will be provided for Eco-Cute that meet certain requirements of energy-saving performance. It is expected that these subsidies will help boost the demand of Eco-Cute in FY2023.