Why not have a heating unit shared by many houses?
Such a unit could be owned and maintained by the city.
Wouldn't this be safer than expecting the owners of a house to maintain one?
Similarly, you could have an air conditioning unit shared by many houses and maintained by the city.
Most Nordic cities have central heating plants for millions of homes. This water is recycled, colored bright green and have non-corrosive additives.
Helsinki has also central cooling system utilizing near-by Baltic sea. There is also yearly discussion about using the heating radiators for cooling. Unfortunately system is not designed for that and condensation will damage buildings.
You mean district heating and district cooling? That has been invented but requires a certain density.
Whats next? Not building houses out of cardboard?
I think this was more common many years ago, when it was difficult to make a reasonably reliable and efficient heating/cooling system, particularly the small scale.
Modern HVAC systems can be very efficient, use minimal materials, and require only electricity lines run between homes, for a considerably lower overall infrastructure cost and good efficiency compared to a district system with very extensive plumbing.
I lived in Chicago recently and it was pretty common there, with fat heat pipes running through several apartments channeling heat from some central distribution system.
It’s not uncommon to see multiple duplexes share a single geothermal heat pump is Sweden.
This is a great idea; so much so that steam has been available as a utility in NYC since 1882!
Somebody has been playing Frostpunk.