In the Upstate, some home upgrades pay back through a six-month cooling season and some on the winter nights when a heat pump runs its strips. Some pay back every month, and one pays back on the day a summer storm would otherwise have cost a compressor. Here are six upgrades that you’ll see come back to you with savings, each a job Carolina Heating Service does in Greenville homes, sorted by the season the savings arrive, with figures from the Department of Energy where they exist.
In summer, a variable-speed heat pump
The largest investment on the list is the one to make when the current system is near the end of its life. A variable-speed heat pump runs at whatever capacity the house needs rather than cycling on and off at full power, and in Upstate humidity that means longer, gentler cycles that pull moisture from the air, a house that feels comfortable at a higher thermostat setting, and less electricity for the same comfort from April into October. It also wears more slowly, since a compressor that ramps up gently avoids hard starts, and a new system from Carolina Heating Service carries a 10-year parts and labor warranty.
Also in summer, a whole-home dehumidifier
Greenville’s humidity is why a house can be cool and uncomfortable at the same time, and the usual response, lowering the thermostat, raises the bill without fixing the dampness. A whole-home dehumidifier removes the moisture itself, which lets the house feel comfortable at a higher setting and gives the air conditioner shorter days. It also protects what humidity damages, from wood floors that cup to closets that grow mold, and for a house that stays sticky with a healthy cooling system it solves the problem rather than chasing it.
Come winter, a smart thermostat
The Department of Energy estimates that setting a thermostat back 7 to 10 degrees for eight hours a day saves as much as 10 percent a year on heating and cooling, and a smart thermostat runs that schedule without anyone remembering. Its Upstate payoff comes in winter, on the heat pumps most Greenville homes rely on: it raises the temperature gradually rather than in one jump, so the system does not call its expensive auxiliary heat strips to get there, and on a heat pump the strips are where the winter bill lives. It also reports faults, which turns a failed capacitor into a notification rather than a cold house.
In both seasons, duct sealing
Ductwork in an Upstate attic spends the summer in 130-degree air and the winter over a crawl space on damp clay, and over the years its joints separate and pour conditioned air into spaces nobody lives in. Sealing the joints and seams recovers that air in both seasons, lowers the bill every month the system runs, and very often fixes the far bedroom that never held its temperature. It is a modest job that can be done alongside duct cleaning through our air duct service, and it makes every other upgrade on this list work better.
Every month, a tankless water heater
Water heating is typically a home’s second-largest energy use, and a tank heater spends a good part of that keeping 50 gallons hot around the clock whether anyone is home or not. A tankless heater runs only while hot water is used, which the Department of Energy estimates saves 24 to 34 percent for lower-use households, and it lasts about twice as long as a tank, so one unit serves the years in which a tank would be replaced twice. Our post on the five questions we ask before recommending tankless covers who should switch and who should not.
When the storms come, whole-home surge protection
The last upgrade does not lower a bill. It prevents a loss, and in one of the more lightning-prone regions of the country the loss is not hypothetical. Every summer thunderstorm and every restoration after an outage sends surges through Upstate panels, and each one shortens the life of the electronics in the heating and cooling system, the refrigerator, the water heater, and everything with a screen. A whole-home surge protector, installed at the panel by our electricians in about an hour, guards every circuit at once and costs a small fraction of the compressor it protects. It pays back on the afternoon a strike hits a line a few blocks away and nothing in the house notices.
One company for all six
Carolina Heating Service has served Greenville and the Upstate since 1981 with heating, cooling, indoor air quality, plumbing, and electrical under one roof, which means every upgrade here can be evaluated and installed by one company. Schedule an evaluation online or through the 24/7 website chat, and the technician will say plainly which upgrades would return the most for your house and in which season, with the price presented before the work and financing available for each. Members of the Carolina Comfort Club receive priority service and member pricing on repairs along the way.