Dunno about all Europe, but I visited a few recently built apartments in Belgium lately and all of them have heat pumps, this is the only way one can get the A energy efficiency ratings.
Heat pumps work as aircos or heaters but are more efficient.
The article wants to cherry-pick to make it seem like no one in Europe is installing heat-pumps. My partner works in energy research and the prevailing advice seems to be ‘insulation first, remediation second’. That's it. We build much better houses, and the European South is installing more and more AC; but that's also where solar plays a bigger role.
Anecdata, but our A-rated apartment in Belgium rides heatwaves like it's nothing. We're on the last floor and in the corner of a building that gets sun from midday to sundown. A floor fan to move air around and that's it, the building's built-in ventilation and good insulation keep us going. It gets to 26C inside max, and that's after 2–3 weeks of outside temps above 32C (after the brick mass has absorbed too much heat that radiates inwards). In winter we barely need heating.
I have de warmtepomp and it doesn't really AC. It pumps the water through the floors (warm in winter, cold in summer) and cools the house down a few degrees, so when the outsides are 35C for a few days, it's enough to close the windows to have the house somewhere around 25 insides, but it doesn't really get it cold.
I had a proper split system AC before and it's a different thing entirely. Press a button and have a flow of freezing cold air in the face.
Heat pumps work as aircos or heaters but are more efficient.