Northeast
Window mounted heat pumps in NYC represent 'promising climate solution'
For 27 years, the heat in Regina Fred’s Queens apartment building came from a noisy steam radiator that she couldn’t control and sometimes didn’t come on at all, leaving her shivering. Sometimes, the radiators ran so hot that residents had to keep their windows open in the middle of winter for relief.
That all changed a few months ago, when she got a window-mounted heat pump as part of a pilot project by the New York City Housing Authority aimed at cutting energy costs and lowering emissions. Suddenly, all Fred has to do is touch a dial to bump her temperature up or down, and she found herself enjoying “a very good silence.”
“They did a demonstration for me and I was thrilled,” Fred said. Now, her grown children call the heat pump “the best thing” she has in her apartment, and her neighbors have knocked on her door to check out the unit.
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Heat pumps, a highly efficient technology that has grown in popularity in recent years to rival gas furnaces, have mainly been an option for owners of houses. But new designs are making them practical for apartments, too, which often rely on inefficient centralized steam boilers powered by oil or gas. That represents a promising climate solution for buildings, whose operations account for 26% of global energy-related carbon emissions, according to the International Energy Agency.
The IEA said last year that installing heat pumps in apartment buildings and commercial areas should “be a priority area” to maintain the growth necessary to meet national climate pledges worldwide. The U.S. alone has 23 million apartment units, according to the National Multifamily Housing Council, representing a huge sector of people who could use less energy with heat pumps.
New York law requires buildings to make big cuts in greenhouse gas emissions over the next decades. To comply, NYCHA is targeting heating and cooling, the largest source of emissions for the agency, which houses about 528,000 people across more than 2,400 buildings — or about one in 17 New Yorkers, said Shaan Mavani, the agency’s chief asset and capital management officer.
Centralized steam boilers powered by natural gas or oil typically provide the heat, and they are wasteful — the NYCHA’s climate mitigation roadmap calls steam heat “19th-century technology incompatible with 21st-century needs.” Mavani said between 30% and 80% of heat is lost through old and leaky infrastructure before it reaches apartments. And that doesn’t account for the waste when residents have to open their windows to dissipate excess heat from a system they can’t control.
Queens borough resident Regina Fred touches one of her window-mounted heat pumps. The installation of heat pumps is part of a New York City Housing Authority pilot project, which aims to cut costs and emissions. (AP Photo)
Eric Wilson, a senior research engineer for the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory, led a team that analyzed heat pump performance in various electric grid scenarios and found even the lowest-efficiency pump would cut greenhouse gas emissions and save on operating costs in every U.S. state. That analysis didn’t include the kind of pump being tested in Queens because it wasn’t yet on the scene, but Wilson said he would expect similar results.
Most heat pumps require ductwork, which isn’t an option for renters in a unit they don’t own. And ductless systems typically require extensive installation that includes wiring, making a hole in a wall and a sizeable external compressor.
Gradient and Midea, the two companies making the units in the pilot project at Woodside House, downsized it all into something that looks a bit like a window air conditioner but with a much lower profile. Exterior and interior halves drape over a sill to leave the window mostly unobscured. Gradient, one of the companies, says its unit installs in 15 minutes and plugs into an ordinary wall outlet.
Wilson said the interior portion of the units “take up more space on the inside than you might be used to” but Fred called it “very beautiful.”
“Look, I even have it for decoration,” she said. Her three window units are usually topped by flowers and decorative candles. In one room on a particularly sunny day, morning light shone on a rose, a jar of rose petals, decorative boxes and a “LOVE” sign atop one of them.
Z Smith, an architect at the firm Eskew Dumez Ripple who isn’t involved in the Queens project, said such retrofitting “is the carbon-smart way to get to better comfort for occupants.” That’s because one of the most effective ways to cut emissions from buildings is to avoid putting up new ones, which result in significant emissions due to all the new concrete, steel and wood.
He called the low-profile heat pumps a “lightweight intervention” because they’re so easy to install.
The NYCHA will evaluate results of the pilot project, with plans to eventually install more than 4,000 heat pumps over two years in the Woodside development if all goes well. The authority expects to save money on operating and maintenance costs with the heat pumps, but is waiting to see for initial results before it projects those savings.
Gradient was founded seven years ago in San Francisco with the ambition to decarbonize buildings with a window unit heat pump that can be easily installed without technicians. Part of their goal was a solution for people just like those at Woodside, CEO Vince Romanin said — people in older multi-family buildings with complaints about their window ACs or aged radiators that don’t have a temperature setting.
“We think that if you’re not building solutions for people who need it most, if you’re not building solutions for people who have insufficient heating (and) cooling today, they’re not really solving climate change,” Romanin said.
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The Pittsburgh Steelers’ pair of young quarterbacks received some refreshing news regarding Brendan Sorsby.
With the NFL opting not to hold a supplemental draft this summer and thus ensuring Sorsby’s only other opportunity to enter the league is by declaring for the 2027 NFL Draft, both Will Howard and Drew Allar won’t face any competition from another up-and-coming signal caller this summer.
While next year’s draft is still the target for the Steelers when it comes to finding a franchise quarterback, having to kick the can down the road in this instance means Howard and Allar now have additional time to prove themselves and aren’t at risk of losing their respective roles in 2026.
How Howard Benefits
Unless Pittsburgh was willing, or planning, to carry four quarterbacks had it landed Sorsby in the supplemental draft before it was nixed, Howard was all but certain to part ways with the organization.
Perhaps he would’ve latched back onto the practice squad if he were cut and subsequently cleared waivers, but the 24-year-old would’ve otherwise become a complete afterthought behind Sorsby and Allar.
The outlook on Howard ever becoming a long-term starter for the Steelers is grim at best. Because Sorsby won’t be on the roster this season, however, his battle with Mason Rudolph for the backup job behind Aaron Rodgers won’t be rendered obsolete.
It’s possible Howard could win it over Rudolph and show enough leading into the 2027 campaign that he could earn the starting role to open the year before Allar or a rookie takes over.
That feels like it’s looking too far ahead, though. In the present, the fact that Sorsby isn’t on the team means Howard’s odds of cracking the 53-man roster remain rather high.
Allar Is In a Good Spot
Assuming trading Allar was never on the table regardless of their potential plans if they had brought Sorsby in, the Penn State product was always going to be on the Steelers’ roster in 2026.
The third-round rookie would’ve had far more of a convoluted path to any sort of meaningful role with the team had Sorsby shared the quarterback room with him, though.
Their strengths are incredibly similar, though Sorsby has a significant leg-up over Allar in terms of his mobility, which could’ve ultimately been the difference down the line in any position battle between the two.
It’s still too early to champion Allar, and it’s likely that a first-round quarterback in the 2027 draft would usurp him if that’s the direction Pittsburgh ends up going in.
Nevertheless, with less pressure and more focus from the coaching staff on helping him develop than there would’ve been if Sorsby were in town, Allar doesn’t have to worry about competing with another signal caller when he isn’t really ready to do so.
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Merrill Lynch has hired a veteran Morgan Stanley manager to help oversee branches in Connecticut, western Massachusetts and portions of New York.
Jairzinho “Jazz” Skair joined Merrill as a market manager overseeing offices in Hartford, New Haven, Springfield, Glastonbury, West Hartford, Farmington, Mystic, Guilford, Southbury and Ridgefield, a Merrill spokesperson confirmed. He reports to Central Shoreline Connecticut Market Executive William Cholawa, who returned to the thundering herd in 2024 after around a decade at UBS.
Skair had most recently been a branch manager for Morgan Stanley in Hartford, according to his LinkedIn. He had started his career in the legal department at UBS Wealth Management USA in 1998 and served in a number of finance, sales and management roles, including branch manager in Westport, before joining Morgan Stanley in 2023.
“I had the opportunity to work closely with Jazz during my time at UBS and saw firsthand his passion for coaching, developing people, and driving results,” Cholawa said in a LinkedIn post announcing the hire. “He is a servant leader who believes in being Authentic, Present, and Useful, and those principles are reflected in the way he leads and supports others.”
A Morgan Stanley spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment.
Merrill and its wirehouse peers have been shuffling and poaching field leaders as they seek to bolster recruiting in an increasingly competitive market.
To that end, Merrill said it had hired two father-son teams with a combined $560 million in client assets. Both joined on June 17.
Roy Savarick and his son, Evan, joined Merrill from Wells Fargo Advisors where they managed around $280 million in assets, according to the Merrill spokesperson. They generated around $2.3 million in annual revenue.
The elder Savarick, a 44-year industry veteran, is based in the firm’s Florida Tropics market led by Jason Edelmann. Evan, who has 12 years of experience, works in New York City from Merrill’s Park Avenue office led by Joe Doonan. They had joined Wells in 2022 from Morgan Stanley, according to BrokerCheck records.
Separately, Brandon K. Pribyl and his sons, Tobey and Bailey, joined Merrill from Baird Private Wealth Management. They had around $280 million in assets and are based in Davenport, Iowa, according to the spokesperson.
The team, which generated around $1.9 million in annual revenue, is part of the Mid Land Market led by Will Cohen. The senior Pribyl had spent the first decade of his career at Merrill. He was not registered between 2009 and 2016 when he joined with Baird, according to BrokerCheck.
(Updated with clarification on the market manager role.)
The recent rain in Maine is easing the drought that parts of the state have been experiencing since the fall.
Scott Dean, a Spectrum meteorologist, said much of Maine has been at least “dry” for several months. Parts of the state, including Portland, Bangor and Bar Harbor, are under a “moderate” drought.
Much of the country is also experiencing a drought, Dean added. The Southeast is seeing extreme levels of drought, and the West coast has been under a drought for years. There are many factors that go into this, including climate change, weather patterns like El Niño and La Niña and other factors.
And, when an area does experience drought, it can become a feedback loop. With less moisture in the ground and atmosphere, the drought can “feed upon itself,” Dean said.
“It takes a while to get into a drought and it also takes a while to get out of one,” Dean said.
But, the rainy days in Maine have been alleviating the drought, Dean said. And, the trend is likely to continue — the forecast is predicting above average levels of precipitation for the next three to four weeks.
“Hopefully, we are continuing to head in the right direction as the drought has eased in these areas,” Dean said.
In fact, if these rains do continue, Maine could come out of the drought sometime this summer.
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