How Heatpumps Work

A heat pump makes your home warmer by drawing heat from the outside air and transferring that heat through the heat pump coils to the inside of your home and cools your home by reversing the flow of refrigerant and transferring the heat from inside to outside.

How it works...

1. The Compressor
   The compressor is the heart of the system, the refrigerant as a gas is sucked into the compressor where it is compressed which raises the pressure and the temperature, the hot gas is then pumped to....
    
2. The indoor coil
   Here the refrigerant passes through the coil where fins around the tubing with the help of the fan transfers the heat to the surrounding air in the home and turns the refrigerant into a liquid...
    
3. The Blower
   The blower or fan moves the air over the indoor and outdoor coils pushing the heat into the room and gathers the heat energy from the outside air....
    
4. The outdoor coil
   The liquid refrigerant is now pumped to the outdoor coil where the heat is recovered from the outdoor air and returns the refrigerant back to a gas which is again sucked back to the compressor to start the cycle again
    
5. Reversing Valve
   This is the valve that reverses the flow of the refrigerant to give us either heating or cooling to the indoor coil

That is why in cooling the air blowing out from the outdoor unit is so hot because it contains heat energy that was inside your home just a second or two ago.