Is it time to replace your old, worn-out heating and cooling system? If your heating and cooling equipment is more than 10 years old or isn't making your home as comfortable as you'd like, consider installing a high-efficiency system. Make your home more comfortable Reduce your energy usage and carbon footprint Save you money for years to come And the best part? If your new equipment meets our eligibility requirements, you could get a $600 rebate! Switching to a more energy-efficient system can save you big. You might be surprised at which areas of your home use the most energy. Heating and cooling use the most energy in an average household – more than 40 percent of your monthly bill comes from the energy needed to heat and cool your home. Installing an energy-efficient heat pump can save you up to $300 on your heating and cooling costs each year. This chart illustrates how much you can save when you install a new HVAC system that uses less energy to heat and cool your home.

A SEER number is an energy efficiency rating. The higher the number, the less energy the system needs to use to make your home comfortable. And the benefits add up! These figures represent the expected overall performance of the unit for a year, based on average weather and location.Annual operating cost based on 3 ton heat pump and .10 kilowatt-hours. single unit ac heatAverage cooling degree days based on Charlotte, North Carolina, from 2009 - 2013. how to de ice an ac unitOperating cost vary depending on climate conditions, home characteristics, energy rates and usage patterns.how to clean indoor ac unit This program is available to Duke Energy residential electric service customers residing in single-family homes, condominiums, mobile homes, townhomes and duplexes.

Additionally, all application and supporting documentation must be successfully submitted and approved within 90 days of date of service after April 16, 2016. Find a participating contractor in your area. *On qualified HVAC replacement, a quality install checklist must be performed to ensure 90 percent net capacity has been achieved at time of installation as rated by AHRI.**Qualified product must be purchased through a participating contractor, installed and programmed through customer's home Wi-Fi network at time of equipment installation. How do I know if I'm eligible? To be eligible, you must be a Duke Energy customer, and your new equipment must be installed by one of our participating contractors. Also, your equipment must meet the SEER/EER requirements listed in the table above.The program is open to residential customers in single-family and manufactured homes that are at least 1 year old. In addition, the program is also available for residential multifamily developments interested in making energy-efficient improvements to their existing residential buildings.

What is a SEER/EER? The Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ratio (SEER) and Energy Efficiency Ratio (EER) both are rating systems to measure the efficiency of your heat pump or air conditioner when it cools your home. The higher the number, the less energy the system uses. Make sure the unit you purchase has a SEER/EER rating certified by the Air Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute (AHRI). What is an HSPF? This is an energy efficiency rating for heat pumps. The higher the number, the less energy the system uses in winter heating. Make sure the unit you purchase has an HSPF rating certified by the Air Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute (AHRI). What is an ECM fan motor? The electric fan in your indoor unit is responsible for a good portion of your electric heating costs. Older, standard fans use much more energy than new energy-efficient electronically commutative motor (ECM) fans. Sometimes called a �variable speed� fan, an ECM fan also offers many other features for added comfort in your home.

An ECM fan on your indoor unit is required for each qualifying air conditioner or heat pump. Can a new home qualify for Smart $aver Incentives? Builders can submit an application for Smart $aver rebates on a new home after both of these events have occurred: 1) the HVAC system, including the outdoor unit, is fully installed and working and 2) the new home has the electric meter installed. How do I apply for the HVAC replacement incentive? After the participating contractor completes the work, he or she will fill out and submit the rebate form, along with any required documentation. Once we receive it, you will get your cash rebate in the mail. What types of residential HVAC systems qualify for the Smart $aver incentive? What is a participating contractor? Each participating contractor is a local heating and cooling professional who has met Duke Energy requirements. Only these participating contractors are approved to perform work eligible for Duke Energy Smart $aver rebates.

After the participating contractor completes the work, he or she will submit the rebate form to receive your cash incentive. Why does Duke Energy want to help me use less energy? By 2030, demand for electricity in the United States is expected to grow by approximately 25 percent. In the past, utilities like Duke Energy would build new power plants to keep up with the rising demand for power.But building new power plants is expensive, and each takes years to complete. Plus, new power plants can have a negative impact on our environment.The cleanest, most efficient power plant is the one we never have to build. If we can help our customers save energy � and save money in the process � it can reduce the demand for new power plants.Image 1 of 3 Is the ductless minispit head shown in this photo unattractive or obtrusive? Green Building Advisor technical director Peter Yost sent the photo to a dozen friends and colleagues to find out what they thought. Ductless minisplit heat pumps have gotten many favorable reviews at Green Building Advisor, but Roy Goodwin sums up a concern that's popped up more than once: Despite their virtuoso heating and cooling performance, they're a little on the homely side.

"My wife and I are 69," Goodwin writes in Q&A post at GBA. "We're in the process of designing a house for our retirement with our architect. It's going to be a 'pretty good house' with a very small heating/cooling load. Neither my wife nor I think the ductless minisplits are all that attractive." In addition, Goodwin adds, the air filters on a wall-mounted head could be a challenge to change because of their location. Ceiling-mounted ducted minisplits look like they'd present similar challenges and require a step ladder for filter changes. That's something they'd like to avoid. Their 2,000-square-foot house will be built in the mountains of western North Carolina in Climate Zone 4. "We're looking for something like a conventional heat pump (ducts and all) with air filters that are easier to access," Goodwin says.That's the topic for this Q&A Spotlight. While the indoor units of ductless minisplits are usually mounted high enough on the wall to keep them out of the way, there's no reason they can't be lowered, GBA senior editor Martin Holladay points out.

He includes a photograph of a unit mounted on an interior wall at roughly knee-height (see Image #2, below.). Ductless Minisplit Heat Pumps Just Two Minisplits Heat and Cool the Whole House Installing a Ductless Minisplit System Putting the Duct Back in Ductless HVAC Ducts and Accessories Its location might mean an occasional sore shin, but filter changes would be a snap. Or, adds Dana Dorsett, choose a unit designed for installation on the floor. They look like small wall furnaces, he says, and like fin-tube convectors for hydronic heating systems most ductless floor units circulate air from the front face. "They are easily set into walls or cabinets with the face pretty much flush with the wall," Dorsett says. Mitsubishi, in fact, publishes directions for embedding one of their units in a wall in such a way that its efficiency is unimpeded. Fujitsu website includes specs for a universal floor/ceiling unit that can be mounted on the floor or just high enough on a wall to get a vacuum cleaner underneath.

It can also go right on the ceiling, and the cabinets are just under 8 inches deep. John Semmelhack refers Goodwin to a ducted Mitsubishi Mr. Slim model. A complicating factor for Goodwin is how well these units would fare with high-efficiency air filters (those with high Minimum Efficiency Reporting Values, or MERVs). "We'd like to use something pretty high performance for dust as well as allergies," Goodwin says. "What about something like the Trane XV20i, which is variable capacity?" Goodwin doubts the unit would ever run near its two-ton (24,000 BtuBritish thermal unit, the amount of heat required to raise one pound of water (about a pint) one degree Fahrenheit in temperature—about the heat content of one wooden kitchen match. One Btu is equivalent to 0.293 watt-hours or 1,055 joules. /hour) rating, but it might be better prepared to handle higher static pressures that high-performance filters would create. "Would running it at the low end on its rated capacity, using the variable-speed compressor, be less efficient?"

"Would it have a negative effect on its life expectancy?" "In general," Dorsett replies, "modulating systems run at highest efficiency when modulating at or near their lowest speeds (effectively making the coils oversized for the amount of heat they actually need to exchange). So if your average heating loadRate at which heat must be added to a space to maintain a desired temperature. is around the minimum-modulated output, it can work out well, but if your peak load is below its minimum modulation, it becomes very sub-optimal." When average loads fall below the minimum modulated output, he says, the system begins to lose efficiency to standby power use and surges in power consumption at startup and short-cycling. Similarly, minisplits that are more than 1.5 times as big as they need to be to meet peak loads will see a loss of efficiency, while below that they will operate at near optimal efficiency. He suggests that Goodwin take a look at the Lenox XP25 or the Carrier Greenspeed.

Keep in mind, though, Dorsett adds, that they're more expensive options than "right-sized" ductless systems and come with distribution losses that ductless systems don't have. Further, adds Semmelhack, Goodwin should be able to use a high-MERV filter in any of the low-static minisplit systems on the market. "Again," he writes, "it's a matter of system design/installation, and carefully accounting for the various parts of the system, including filters." Although Goodwin has yet to pin down heating and cooling loads, he describes a house with 2x6 walls filled with blown-in cellulose plus 2 3/4 inches of rigid polyisocyanurate insulation, an attic with 20 inches of cellulose, and insulation in both the foundation walls and floor. Given these parameters, Dorsett adds, the heating load should be less than 20,000 Btu/hour, and could be less than 15,000 Btu/hour with good windows. This, he says, makes a two-ton, high efficiency ducted heat pump "a bit silly." The Fujitsu 18,000 Btu/hour model would more than cover Goodwin's needs.

An alternative would be a pair of floor units connected to a common compressor. A dual-head unit might not be quite as efficient as the "best-in-class perfectly implemented" two-ton ducted model, but the installed cost would be less than half. Goodwin could spend the difference on rooftop solar, which would probably pay for most or all of the heating and cooling bill. We ran this one by Peter Yost, GBA's technical director, and here's what he had to say: I am going to focus on the aesthetics of interior head in my response, just because people’s perceptions when it comes to technology fascinate me. So, I sent out the following email to about a dozen or so colleagues and friends with the photo that you see at the top of the column: This may seem "mysterious," but please take a look at the attached photo and reply to me with whatever aesthetic considerations come to mind from the image. When you reply, THEN I can share with you the nature of my request. Nothing scary, embarrassing, or illegal, and there are no correct or incorrect replies.

All is relevant and correct, whether positive or negative in nature. You can see that I was trying hard not to prejudice the issue of minisplit head aesthetics. When subjects of this “survey” responded, I sent them this followup e-mail: I have been asked to comment on a Green Building Advisor blog in which an older couple thinks that the interior minisplit head (that white box on the right-hand wall is a conditioned air delivery system) looks homely. So, I thought it would be interesting to ask folks from different walks of life and who have had longer and shorter walks (older and younger folks) how much they really noticed the head in a nice-looking kitchen with a lot of different aesthetics along the “old” and “new” lines. Just to see how much, unprompted, their eye was drawn to or affected by this homely head. Now that you know the nature of the issue, if you still have interest, you can let me know what you think of the head, knowing that was the “target” aesthetic question.

And now for the results: I got 12 responses, with respondents varying in age from about 30 to 65. The sample size was just too small to claim any differences in response based on age or their area of expertise (which ranged from building professionals to a sculptor). Only 3 of 12 respondents mentioned anything about the interior minisplit head, and two of those three were more concerned with the “distracting” large open wall space just below the head. There were some repeated themes: Of the 12 initial respondents, 10 followed up to say the hood is essentially unobtrusive, with about half knowing what it was from the start and half not. So, I think the aesthetics of new technology, even something as “bulky” and “homely” as an interior minisplit head, can be more about the aesthetic context than anything else. And we can get desensitized to the aesthetic impact of the conventional and sometimes a bit hypersensitive to the new. PS – On the difficulty of cleaning/replacing the minisplit interior head filters: You pop open the front grille and the filters are right there to slide in and out with ease.