Latest / Shafer Heating and Cooling Service Repair Podcast / What Is The Differnce Between a Heat Pump and a Furnace?

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What Is The Differnce Between a Heat Pump and a Furnace? · Shafer Heating and Cooling Service Repair Podcast

• 0:01
  Welcome to Check A Pro Radio. I am Checker Pro Joe, Jim Klauck here,
• 0:06
  and I've got one of my favorite guests who's an expert in heating and air conditioning,
• 0:12
  Nathan Shafer. How are you?
• 0:14
  Hey, good, Jim. How are you doing? I am living the dream. Thank you so much
• 0:17
  for joining me today here on the program.
• 0:21
  Okay. I want to be educated a bit and so do the listeners. The questions come
• 0:24
  in to the show about heat pumps.
• 0:28
  And you've told me before that they've changed a lot over the decades and they're
• 0:35
  really a great piece of equipment.
• 0:37
  So the question that's come in is what is the difference between a heat pump and a furnace?
• 0:42
  And before you answer that question, I'm pretty sure they both heat your home, right?
• 0:48
  Correct. Yeah. Both heat your
• 0:49
  home and both are going to be the primary source of heat for your home.
• 0:54
  So a furnace typically is going to be referring to a gas furnace,
• 0:59
  LP or natural, technically is a furnace.
• 1:01
  And so that's going to be heating your home. Those can get up to the highest
• 1:04
  97 or 98% efficient, depending on the brand and makeup of the furnace.
• 1:09
  But that's the best, which meaning that even let's say it's in a perfect world,
• 1:13
  it's the highest you can buy on the market, it's 98%, you're still losing 2% out the flue pipes.
• 1:17
  So for every dollar you spend in LP gas or natural gas, you're getting $98 of
• 1:23
  heat into the home. $2 is going out.
• 1:26
  That's on a $100 analogy, but on a dollar, 98 cents is.
• 1:30
  Two cents is going out the flue pipe. An electric furnace has heating elements.
• 1:34
  That's 100% efficient. And the fact that it's dollar for dollar,
• 1:38
  whereas a heat pump, that's pulling heat out of the outside air across the condenser
• 1:42
  coil and the refrigerant circuit then takes that heat and puts it into the home.
• 1:46
  The refrigerant circuit finishes that cycle.
• 1:49
  But those can be anywhere from 300%, 400% efficient, depending on the outdoor temperature.
• 1:55
  The colder it gets, the less efficient it is, but it's still going to be more
• 1:58
  efficient than a hundred percent at electric or 98% at best with a gas furnace.
• 2:03
  And so dollar for dollar on an average, let's say it's 300%.
• 2:06
  Uh, if I spend a hundred dollars in electricity, I'm getting $300 of heat out of that system.
• 2:12
  And so heat pumps will save you dramatically on your utility bill,
• 2:17
  you know, upwards of commonly, if you see 50 to 60%, uh,
• 2:22
  on your heating bills compared to just running an electric furnace or just a
• 2:26
  propane, you know, gas furnace.
• 2:27
  Now that does pair with it because the system does go in the defrost mode.
• 2:31
  So, you know, in our climate here, we still may need in peak seasons,
• 2:34
  you know, if it's sub-zero temps or something or negative temps,
• 2:38
  it's still going to, that furnace will kick in to help that heat pump and or
• 2:41
  when the system goes in the defrost mode, it has to keep the frost melted off
• 2:44
  the outdoor unit in the weather conditions.
• 2:46
  The furnace is going to kick in to still heat the house while that heat pump
• 2:49
  goes through that cycle.
• 2:51
  So the The heat pump to look at it outside looks just like an air conditioner.
• 2:55
  To look at the outside of us, the internal components that makes that system
• 2:59
  run year round, both for heating and for cooling.
• 3:02
  And it basically just turns the reverse cycle of air conditioning in the wintertime
• 3:08
  and now makes the indoor coil hot that the air is blowing across instead of
• 3:12
  cold like it is in the summertime.
• 3:14
  So it just reverses the refrigerant circuit and now gives you a heating source
• 3:18
  instead of a cooling source.
• 3:20
  Sounds a little more technologically advanced than just having a flame or an
• 3:27
  element in the furnace, but it sounds like it's more efficient.
• 3:32
  100%. Yeah, 100%. And there's so many different options even on the heat pump, right?
• 3:36
  I mean, we're now in today's age, we have inverter-driven technology and things,
• 3:40
  and the systems become smart, and they learn really the habits of the home and what the home needs.
• 3:44
  And so instead of just being on or off, it'll ramp up and down.
• 3:48
  It's not even single-stage or two-stage. It can, it's got hundreds of steps
• 3:52
  into it to where the colder it gets, the more heat it needs, the faster it runs.
• 3:56
  It ramps up like a throttle, if you, if you picture and same with the cooling side.
• 3:59
  So just more and more efficient and smart and saving us on utilities and creating
• 4:04
  better comfort and quieter operating systems.
• 4:06
  The technology is, is, is quite impressive. And then of course,
• 4:09
  the other style of heat pump would be a ground source heat pump,
• 4:13
  which also known as geothermal systems. And so a geothermal system is just a
• 4:17
  heat pump as well, other than it's a ground source heat pump.
• 4:20
  So it's pulling the heat out of the earth, constant temperature all year round,
• 4:23
  instead of out of the outside air like a regular heat pump.
• 4:26
  So once again, the talk efficiencies, that ground source heat pump,
• 4:29
  or better known as a geothermal system, those can be 400% and 500% efficient.
• 4:33
  So even that much more efficient than an air source heat pump.
• 4:36
  So lots of options when it comes to heat pumps.
• 4:40
  Geothermal is great. You probably have thought about this, and I have many times.
• 4:45
  And it's going to sound odd to most people, but why aren't we living?
• 4:50
  Underground. You don't need heat or air conditioning at a certain level subgrade.
• 4:56
  You don't. I mean, you literally can live in a cave and you don't need what
• 5:02
  we need, but we expose ourselves on top of the earth to all the elements that we have to heat and cool.
• 5:09
  I would suggest if we didn't have a lot of money, we might want to dig our homes
• 5:13
  in the ground because that's how geothermal works, right? Because it's a nice
• 5:17
  temperature down there.
• 5:19
  Yeah, absolutely. And just like your air source heat pump, it still has a refrigerant
• 5:22
  circuit and it just finishes the cycle, but it labors so much less because it's
• 5:26
  dealing with a constant temperature year round instead of the 95 degree day
• 5:30
  to 70 degree day to 20 degree day.
• 5:33
  So a heat pump has to fluctuate and work harder or less hard depending on the outside temperature.
• 5:38
  Whereas like geothermal heat pump, it's like just setting up on cruise control
• 5:41
  and just purge right along year round.
• 5:43
  Yeah. Geothermal is kind of like, uh, not having to go up or downhills.
• 5:49
  You're just, you're just coasting. It's, it's always the same.
• 5:52
  Um, and it's, uh, you know, for those of you who are thinking of building a
• 5:57
  new home, you might want to think about building a home underground.
• 6:00
  Some people do, they'll build into cliffs and stuff.
• 6:03
  And, and, you know, some people are really into that and they're like,
• 6:06
  we don't even have to pay for heating or cooling and, and they need ventilation of sorts, I guess.
• 6:10
  And you have to watch out for some other things, but it's very interesting.
• 6:15
  And on that note, Nathan, as always, thank you for joining me today and thank
• 6:18
  you for bringing your expertise to the program. Hey, my pleasure. Anytime. Thanks, Jim.