My Secret Formula: 9 Steps to Ditch Your Gas Furnace

Heat pumps are great for a number of reasons, including overall improved indoor comfort, reduced HVAC noise, better air filtration, continuous indoor air mixing, better dehumidification, more fresh air (if you opt for an energy recovery ventilator), and more precise load matching.

You might also be interested because there’s so much money available for them nowadays (especially in Holland, Michigan… more coming soon for the rest of Michigan).

Or you might be interested in reducing your carbon footprint. Switching from a furnace to a heat pump is a meaningful way to do that (~25% of your footprint). Oh, also, heat pumps will never produce carbon monoxide or other dangerous combustion byproducts.

Whatever your reason for switching, how do you know if you can get one?? You could “plug and play” by matching your current furnace and air conditioner size, but this is not recommended and leads to a number of poor outcomes. Most notably, you won’t get the perks listed in the first paragraph, it might cost too much, and you could wear out the motor too quickly.

Here’s my secret heat pump formula for getting from deflated to pumped up! Please note, these are not things you worry about and coordinate yourself. You just need to find a home performance professional who can walk you through the process.

1. Get an energy audit with a blower door (the blower door is needed for #2 and #6).

2. Simultaneously, run a heating/cooling load calculation (avoid “rules of thumb” by actually measuring things like insulation, and include the blower door number, from #1, in the calculation).

3. Estimated annual run costs of the new heat pump system (don’t worry about monthly).

4. Duct pressure test, to see if your new heat pump is appropriately sized for your existing ducts.

5. Indoor air quality (IAQ) analysis:

1. RedCalc (an ASHRAE 62.2 tool that lets me know if your home is getting the recommended amount of ventilation air for human health).

2. Run the IAQ monitor (provides additional, more detailed information).

6. Optional: building shell improvements if the home was leaky (as determined in #1) and/or the run costs were too high (as determined in #3).

7. Heat pump installation.

8. Optional: energy recovery ventilator, if the IAQ was on shaky ground (as determined in #5).

9. Test out.