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Home > Residential Services > Heating
Heating
Southwest Florida Heating Options
Heat Pump or Straight Cool with Electric Heater
The two most popular heating methods in Southwest Florida are the Heat Pump or Straight Cool with electric heater.
With the mild to moderate winters in Southwest Florida, the evaluation of your HVAC professional will prove invaluable in deciding on the best heating method for the size and location of your home or business. In the northern area of Southwest Florida, the Heat Pump is more popular while in the southern region where there is a limited time frame where heating is necessary you may find the Straight Cool with electric heat the better choice.
Let’s compare the features and benefits these two heating methods provide and how they operate:
Heat Pumps
Heat Pumps look and work very much like an air conditioner. A heat pump pulls heat out of the air or ground to heat a building or you can switch them into reverse to cool you home or business. An air source heat pump operates like a refrigeration system by extracting heat from one source and transferring it to another source. A heat pump will use electric heat to assist with heating during defrosts or more extreme cold weather.
A heat pump can provide an energy-efficient alternative to furnaces in regions with mild to moderate weather extremes. Heat pumps can give your home up to 4 times the amount of energy that they consume. What this means for you is that for every dollar you spend on electricity you get four dollars worth of heating. During the summer cooling season, heat pumps will perform similar to a normal air conditioner and absorb heat from inside your home or business and discharge it outdoors.
Straight Cool with Electric Heat
In the southern most area of Southwest Florida, the Straight Cool with electric heat strips tends to be the method of choice for heating. Straight Cool with electric heat provides a popular heating solution for areas with an extremely short heating season. This reasonably priced solution is ideal for extreme south climates for both equipment replacement and new construction. Use the expertise of your HVAC contractor as an essential information resource for determining the heating method that will work best for your home or business and your location.
To summarize; a heat pump “pumps” heat from one place to another. In the northern part of Southwest Florida, the heat pump usually proves to be a more affordable method to heat your home or business in the winter and cool it in the summer. In the southern region of Southwest Florida, the straight cool with electric heat usually provides a more economical method for heating your home or business.
