Avoid That Kick-In-The-Gut Feeling When Your Cooling Equipment Dies: Follow This Replacement Strategy

Reduce your cooling load
Your cooling load refers to how much energy you need to cool your home. It’s affected by many things, such as energy leaks, the size of your home and how much heat appliances put out. By making small home improvements, you can decrease your cooling load and possibly buy a smaller cooling system.

A few suggestions:

• Plug air leaks around windows, doors and pipes and through the attic.
• Seal and insulate air ducts.
• Add insulation to reduce energy loss.
• Switch to high-efficiency light bulbs, which consume less energy and produce less heat.

Investigate your cooling options
Homeowners today have many efficient cooling choices. Heat pumps provide both heat and air conditioning and can generate four units of energy for every unit they consume. Compared with air conditioners manufactured 10 years ago, today’s high-efficiency ACs consume 20 to 40 percent less energy. Look for a system with a high SEER rating.

Think about cost
Sticker price represents about a quarter of what you’ll pay for the system over all. Most of your cost will be utilities and maintenance. Consider fuel use, too. When changed into cooling energy, different fuel sources have different efficiency ratios.

Hire a quality contractor
Your new cooling system won’t perform at peak efficiency unless it’s sized in proportion to your cooling load. Proper installation is also important, and many contractors take shortcuts instead of doing the job right. Look for NATE certified technicians, who guarantee service up to national standards.

If your air conditioning fails, don't panic. First, consider your needs. How important is efficiency? What about environmental sustainability? What fuels are available?

For new cooling equipment, call Rodenhiser. We’ll help you select the perfect replacement for your home.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems).  For more information about replacing your cooling equipment and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Solutions Guide.

Rodenhiser Plumbing, Heating and Air Conditioning serves the Route 495/128 area of Massachusetts. Visit our website to see our special offers to get started today!