4 Types of Heat Pumps for Your Boca Raton Home

A heat pump uses electricity to transfer heat from an area with a lower temperature to a place with a higher one. It can save energy and lower your Boca Raton, Florida, home’s utility bills by moving heat energy instead of creating it. Refrigerators and air conditioners work a lot like heat pumps, but they only move heat one way instead of changing directions with the seasons. Several types of heat pumps are available, including ductless, packaged, hybrid, and pool systems. Read on to learn how these systems can be beneficial for your home.

Ductless Heat Pumps

Most heat pumps have an outdoor unit, an indoor air handler, and a system of ductwork to bring conditioned air to all the rooms in your home. Ductless or mini-split systems often have more than one indoor air handler, and they use less energy because they don’t need to move air through ducts.

A network of conduits for refrigerant connects the indoor units, and they’re compact and easy to install. You can have them placed on walls or ceilings. That way, you’ll never have to worry about leaks in your ductwork. Pests, dust, dirt, biological growth, and other contaminants also won’t have a chance to accumulate there. These pollutants can lead to excess dust on your furniture, rashes, headaches, sore throats, or asthma or allergy symptoms. If your home already has ductwork, your installer will block your air registers to prevent issues before adding a ductless system.

Packaged Heat Pumps

A packaged heat pump has most of their parts in one casing. There’s no separate indoor air handler, and the outdoor unit pushes conditioned air through the ductwork. They’re easy to install and maintain since they come from the factory mostly assembled. Shorter conduits for refrigerant make them more efficient as well. Units that fit on the ground near your home, on your roof, in a window, or on a wall are available.

You can even choose a ductless packaged heat pump. If you have more than one unit installed, you can control different areas or zones independently. This lets you save energy by not heating or cooling unoccupied rooms.

Hybrid Systems

Hybrid or dual-fuel HVAC systems include a heat pump and another type of heater that works as a backup in extremely cold weather. When the temperature drops more than a few degrees below freezing, efficiency decreases for most heat pumps, and they have to use more energy to transfer heat from the outdoor air to your home.

There aren’t many days below freezing here in Florida, but a hybrid system will keep you from being uncomfortable or wasting energy when it does get cold. The backup heater can be a simple electric device similar to a space heater or a natural gas or propane furnace. In most hybrid systems, you can switch the device that’s used for heat from the heat pump to the backup whenever you want. Even if it’s not very cold outside, low fuel prices can sometimes make the furnace in a hybrid system less costly than the heat pump.

Pool Heat Pumps

You can use a specially designed heat pump to heat your pool, letting your family use it sooner in spring and later in fall. These devices work a lot like home heat pumps. Having a pool heat pump installed by professionals, like the ones at Stephen K. Denny, Inc., can increase the value of your home.

A pump directs the water in the pool through a filter and over hot condenser coils filled with refrigerant. When the refrigerant cools and becomes a liquid, it goes to the evaporator coil, where it absorbs heat from the outside air. When it becomes a gas, it returns to the condenser coils. Since all types of heat pumps can transfer more heat in humid air, they work especially well in the region’s moist weather.

Stephen K. Denny, Inc. is a Trane Comfort Specialist, and we have an A+ rating from the Better Business Bureau. We can help you decide on the best heat pump for your home. For more information and outstanding service, call us anytime at (561) 250-7415.

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