Heat Pumps
Ductless and ducted heat pumps have become an extremely popular home heating alternative to traditional oil and electric heaters & furnaces in Nova Scotia.
Heat pumps produce a very comfortable heat for a fraction the cost as well as provide air conditioning and dehumidification all summer long.
There are two primary types of air to air heat pumps: ductless mini splits and central ducted heat pump systems.
The type of heat pump system that is ideal for you is dependent on the homes heating system.
Ductless Mini Split Heat Pumps
If you currently have electric baseboard, oil hot water baseboard, in floor radiant heating or any other type of “zoned” heating system (zoned meaning you have more than one thermostat in the home) than a ductless heat pump system is right for you.
Central Ducted Heat Pumps
If you currently have a forced hot air furnace, whether it’s oil, propane or electric, a central ducted system is the ideal choice for you.
Central heat pump systems connect to your current ductwork to deliver heat to each room in a similar fashion to your current furnace.
Heat pumps (both ducted and ductless) work by extracting heat that exists in the outdoor air down to temperatures as low as -15 to -25 degrees celsius. That heat is then transferred into your home through refrigerant.
The reason heat pumps are so efficient and cost effective for homeowners in Nova Scotia is because they don’t use electricity to create heat. They are simply moving heat around that already exists in the outdoor air.
There is quite a bit of physics behind how a heat pump transfers heat from the outdoors to indoors, but we’ve created a short video that simplifies it for you.
Savings with a heat pump are the difference between what you’re currently spending on electric or oil costs minus the much lower cost of operating the heat pump.
The math is a bit different depending on if you your home is heated with oil or electricity.
To learn more about how you save money with a heat pump click the video above that matches your homes current heating system.
Homeowners we’ve worked with in HRM are seeing savings of 30% to 40% on their home heating costs. This amount is difficult to express in dollars because there are so many variables that affect things including:
- Outdoor temperature
- Amount of insulation in your home
- How much you are spending on oil or electricity now
We’ve created two example scenarios you that explain how much you could potentially save by installing a heat pump system. The videos above will help explain how much you could potentially save.
All this discussion about how a heat pump saves you money is great. However the bottom line for most homeowners is “how much do these things cost?”.
We’ve put together two videos and posts to help explain how much heat pumps cost. The first is for ductless mini split heat pumps. The second is for central ducted systems.
