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After 66 years of life in New England all I know is oil fired forced hot water for home heating. Will be building down south and I see two main options for a combined hot air/AC system:
Gas fired heat
Electric heat pump
Any thoughts or suggestions?
I will already have gas at the house for stove, fireplace and maybe the grill. We are looking at about 2,000 square ft of conditioned area. I expect there will be two zones.
E
Thankyouthankyouverymuch.
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Location: Texas
There are a lot of places people consider south, but each has there dry and wet climates as well as cold vs cool winters.
Some are good for heat pumps and some are better going gas.
If you get a lot of wet and cold- gas heat would be better- or even geothermal for any in between.
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Heat pumps are supposed to be much more efficient, but they only work well within a certain temperature range. Outside that range they fare poorly which is why we don't see them up north.
This from the Department of Energy:
http://energy.gov/energysaver/air-source-heat-pumpsIf it is in use in the area you are moving to, the heat pump is a really good idea.
But every once in a while even in Florida it drops below freezing and the heat pump will not be very efficient at that time.
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I've lived in Georgia and Alabama since moving south. I've had both systems and big are adequate for my climate. That said, I VASTLY prefer forced air gas vs heat pump. It's just based on personal comfort and preference as opposed to any empirical measurement as my heat pumps have kept the house warm. But I just expect the air coming out of the ducts to feel 'warm' unless the secondary electric heat kicked in on the heat pumps I never got that feeling. My current house house has both (heat pump upstairs, gas on main) and I can't tell the difference.
If you have the choose though I guess utility costs would be the determining g factor.
-Marc
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For me the choice would be based on whether that was nat gas or LP. If it's nat gas that would get the nod. With LP heat pumps can be very good, and they have improved a lot over the years. We had LP/air source heat pump (NW Ohio) for about 20 years and the heat pump heated to about 30º (+/-) then the furnace took over. With this unit, the house did feel cooler when the heat pump was doing the work, but the current ,odels are much different (I'm told). Anyway, when we moved 5 years ago (still in NW Ohio
) we went ground source heat pump (geo) and LP furnace. Now the heat pump goes down to about 10º before the furnace kicks in, and the house is actually more comfortable when the heat pump is doing the work....the geo units blow very warm air. That said, depending on exactly where you are in the south I'm not sure a geo would be needed.
I started with absolutely nothing. Now, thanks to years of hard work, careful planning, and perseverance, I find I still have most of it left.
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Good point. We are going to coastal South Carolina, a little north of the Georgia border. We will be on natural gas. I am assuming that the AC does not come into play with my question.
Interesting that one response says the gas heat is more comfortable and another- the heat pump. This is the debate I am looking for.
Geothermic is not in play!
E
Thankyouthankyouverymuch.
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How much does power cost?
Mike
Non impediti ratione cogitationis
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Sorry, I guess I should've specified my heat pumps have all been electric. To be honest I thought they all were!
-Marc
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If I were moving to coastal SC, I wouldn't consider anything other than an electric heat-pump. Heating isn't the concern, cooling is. They don't work too well under 20 degrees ambient and you'll rarely see that. I used to do some college baseball coaching down there every February and I'd come home with a sunburn. I always wore flip-flops, just because I could.
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If you are concerned about it, one advantage of gas heat over heat pump is if you only have a small generator with gas heat you can still have heat. Here in NC, heat pumps are cheaper to operate than propane. I don't know about cost comparison with NG. It gets cold enough here (like this past weekend with lows in the low teens) that the HP can't keep up, but that's maybe 3 nights a year. On the coast of SC 300ish miles south of here I'd imagine it stays warmer.
