Using a geothermal system to heat and cool homes grows more popular as an option with each passing year. A geothermal heat pump offers homeowners a level of stability and dependability for comfort that they could not receive from a standard air-source heat pump. This is especially important in a place like Chicagoland, with our intense winters that put heavy stress on air-source heat pumps, but which won’t bother a geothermal system that has access to the stable temperatures in the earth below the frost line.
Another reason to consider installing a geothermal system in Northbrook, IL is that geothermal power can help you save money. Installing a geothermal system costs more than a standard heat pump because of the digging and extra material and equipment involved, and this sometimes causes potential customers to hesitate: will a geothermal installation save money in the long run? Our technicians at Shavitz Heating and Air Conditioning, who have years of experience installing different kinds of heat pumps, can help answer that question.
How Geothermal Systems Save Money
The reason that geothermal heat pumps (also knowns as GHPs or ground-source heat pumps) are energy efficient is the same reason they work so well in temperature extremes: they access a reliable source of heat from underground so they will not need to overwork either to extract or deposit heat. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, geothermal heat pumps can reach high efficiencies of 300% to 400% on even the coldest winter nights, compared to 175% to 250% for air-source heat pumps on only a cool day.
How much can this efficiency save you? We cannot provide an exact dollar amount, of course, because it depends on the size of your home, the geothermal system, and your pattern of heating and cooling. However, the Department of Energy estimates that the savings from a ground-source heat pump will allow it to earn back its installation cost in 5–10 years. When you consider that, according to the DOE, the average system life expectancy for a geothermal heat pump is 25 years for the inside components and more than 50 years for the ground loops, you will have at the minimum 15 years of excellent energy savings after the end of the payback period. In addition, geothermal systems often raise the value of a home, adding to the amount of money they return on their investment.
Contact Us for More Information About Geothermal Heat Pumps
There are so many reasons to consider installing a geothermal system in Northbrook, IL and other parts of Chicagoland that we cannot list them all in this space. We encourage you to give us a call at Shavitz Heating and Air Conditioning and take advantage of our many decades of work in heating and cooling to provide you with all the information you need to decide if you want geothermal installation for your home.