Using A Ground-Source Heat Pump To Cool Your Home
An air conditioner can be used to cool your home down, but the AC unit you use will be dependent on the outside air temperature. At moderate temperatures, it will be easy enough to push hot air from your house into the air, but the hotter it gets outside, the harder it is for your AC unit to push heat into the air. Thus, when you need your AC unit the most, it is at its least efficient. If you want to tap into greater levels of efficiency, you need to consider installing a ground-source heat pump.
What Is a Heat Pump?
A heat pump uses a refrigerant in a set of evaporator coils to absorb heat from one location and a second set of condenser coils to push that heat into another location. This is exactly how an AC unit works, but it will only push heat in one direction—out of your home. A heat pump can reverse the flow of your coils so that you can both heat and cool your home. Most heat pumps extract heat from the air, which means that their efficiency is dependent on the ever-in-flux nature of air temperatures.
What Is a Ground-Source Heat Pump?
Unlike air temperatures, ground temperatures are much more consistent. In fact, the temperature of the earth 10 feet below the ground stays at 50 degrees year round. The engineers of a ground-source heat pump tap into these constant temperatures by placing a special set of coils below the earth's surface. You, thus, have an endless heat sink which can absorb heat from your house. You can also use the same heat pump to extract heat from the earth during the winter no matter how cool the air above gets. In this way, a ground-source heat pump can reach efficiency levels of up to 600% whether it is heating or cooling a home.
Rather than make your home subject to the ever-changing air temperatures and high heating and cooling bills, you need to think about what you can do to make your HVAC costs so manageable. A ground-source heat pump can greatly reduce your heating and cooling costs. If you want to erase heating and coolings costs altogether, you can install solar panels, a wind turbine, or both to power your heat pump and take it completely off of the grid. A ground-source heat pump is the most efficient way to cool or heat your home.
For further assistance, contact local professionals, such as those from American Independent Heating & Air Conditioning.