Greener Home Grants - Feedback Wanted

[ExtraSlow]

You'd want other heat sources in the mix. Electric heated floors etc. From a technical perspective it's super straightforward to heat a home with electricity.

From an economic perspective, very different conversation.

[davidI]

There are heat pump hot water systems too...

Not sure how they work in Canada's climate but some friends have a new build here in Spain with a heat pump and it's amazing. The heat pump circulates hot water through their flooring in the winters and cold water in the summers so they maintain 20-25C at little cost.

Another friend is an electrician and he did similar but also installed solar panels. Their annual utility costs are something like 30€. Obviously, Spain's climate is different from Canada's but it does get sub-zero here and having the cooling capability in summer is a huge bonus.

[Cash Money Hoes]

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It can, the newer ones maintain >100% efficiency down to -25 or -30C. But for reference when it's warmer (say -10C) out they tent to hover around 400% efficiency. (4 watts of heat for 1 watt of electricity used). So it's more efficient than a regular resistive heater even through winter. The other half is realizing that it doesn't get as cold as people think over the whole winter. Calgary's average Jan temps is -3C high / -15C low. We do get colder snaps but we also get a lot of mild weather so most of the time it's quite efficient.

In theory if you can ditch your gas service all together that'll save almost a grand over the course of the year without having to pay all the extra delivery / service fees and such. Hopefully the higher electricity bill is less than that savings.

I had heat pumps installed at my house. Went with the most efficient ones you could buy (Lennox SL25XPV), not for efficiencies sake, but because they are the quietest (super quiet BTW, would recommend). I think the max efficiency is like 3-4x as noted above and this drops off as you go below 0C outside, which means if gas is 1/4 cost of electricity (unit of energy vs unit of energy) economic break even is when the unit drops below 4x efficiency.

So bottom line is that my top of the line heat pumps are only economically viable to about 0-4C based upon efficiency curve they published. This is with my electricity locked in from 3 years ago at $0.065/kwh. So it is even worse with current lock in of $0.125/kwh. Looked at my electrical bill and all in electricity cost was $0.17/kwh and all in gas cost was $13.01/ GJ. Unit of energy for unit of energy electricity is 3.7x more for me. For normies paying $0.125/kwh its more.

So bottom line its almost always cheaper to heat your house with nat gas assuming you've got a semi decent furnace.

At the end of the day I knew this when we bought the heat pumps. The use case we were going for was super quiet AC units. With the $5k grant, it was cheaper to install heat pumps (which happen to be super quiet AC units) to qualify for the subsidy with plan to not use heat pumps for heating. Sales guy told me the same thing.

I would watch your electricity bills closely if you plan to heat your house with heat pumps for entirety of winter. You're going to have your face ripped off.

[suntan]

Clearly cheap electricity is in the future.

Right?

Right?

[davidI]

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Clearly cheap electricity is in the future.

Right?

Right?

Maybe if the Government would invest in nuclear energy instead of buying auto union votes.

[suntan]

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Maybe if the Government would invest in nuclear energy instead of buying auto union votes.

Sometimes I want to run for Premier on the platform of building many, many nuclear power plants.

[Xtrema]

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So bottom line its almost always cheaper to heat your house with nat gas assuming you've got a semi decent furnace.

At the end of the day I knew this when we bought the heat pumps. The use case we were going for was super quiet AC units. With the $5k grant, it was cheaper to install heat pumps (which happen to be super quiet AC units) to qualify for the subsidy with plan to not use heat pumps for heating. Sales guy told me the same thing.

Who did you deal with? PM me. That's exactly what I'm after.

[ExtraSlow]

Oh yeah for sure. Heat pump is best version of AC without question. When my AC craters I'm doing that upgrade.

[Tik-Tok]

So do you not have a nat.gas furnace at all @Cash Money Hoes ?

[Cash Money Hoes]

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So do you not have a nat.gas furnace at all @Cash Money Hoes ?

I have furnaces and use them to heat my home in winter almost exclusively. I have thermostat set to call on using heat pump for heat when outdoor temp is around 8C or higher.

All central heat pumps need either furnace or air handler to circulate air. Mini splits which are more common in eastern Canada are standalone.

[suntan]

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I have furnaces and use them to heat my home in winter almost exclusively. I have thermostat set to call on using heat pump for heat when outdoor temp is around 8C or higher.

All central heat pumps need either furnace or air handler to circulate air. Mini splits which are more common in eastern Canada are standalone.

What do your elec and gas bills look like? How many sq ft is your home?

[Cash Money Hoes]

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What do your elec and gas bills look like? How many sq ft is your home?

I had the equipment installed and commissioned in August/ September and we’ve had a non existent winter to this point so year over year data is useless.

What I have noticed is that electricity is way down. The old furnace had blowers motors which ran 24/7 year round and I was consuming 1600-2000kwh per month of electricity. Now it’s less than half of that with the ECM blower motors set to circulate (they draw under 2 amps vs old ones which draw 6-8).

House is 5000 sq.ft. And during winter prior to new equipment I paid 800 -950 a month. Last few bills were like 600-650. But no real heating load. This is my all in gas, sewer, electric bill, so I appreciate doesn’t really answer your question.

If I remember, I’ll update this thread with my old system vs new system heating/ electric expense after like 12 months. Very interested to see what difference os myself.

[ExtraSlow]

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What I have noticed is that electricity is way down. The old furnace had blowers motors which ran 24/7 year round and I was consuming 1600-2000kwh per month of electricity. Now it’s less than half of that with the ECM blower motors set to circulate (they draw under 2 amps vs old ones which draw 6-8).

+1 to this. The ECM motors are a worthwhile retrofit to ANY furnace that has the old style (PSC?0 type.

[suntan]

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I had the equipment installed and commissioned in August/ September and we’ve had a non existent winter to this point so year over year data is useless.

What I have noticed is that electricity is way down. The old furnace had blowers motors which ran 24/7 year round and I was consuming 1600-2000kwh per month of electricity. Now it’s less than half of that with the ECM blower motors set to circulate (they draw under 2 amps vs old ones which draw 6-8).

House is 5000 sq.ft. And during winter prior to new equipment I paid 800 -950 a month. Last few bills were like 600-650. But no real heating load. This is my all in gas, sewer, electric bill, so I appreciate doesn’t really answer your question.

If I remember, I’ll update this thread with my old system vs new system heating/ electric expense after like 12 months. Very interested to see what difference os myself.

Nah even this is helpful. I also changed out my furnace blower motor as mine was half dead and saw a huge decrease in electricity usage. Newer ones also move air better, so the furnace is on less, which is something I definitely noticed this week.

Getting your usage down to $600 is amazing, that's what it was sometimes in my 2000 sq ft house, even in low months!

Do you have an HRV?

[msommers]

In our experience the heat pumps ended up being more expensive overall than just an AC unit despite the rebate. For example, the slim Daikin we went with after their factory rebates was $8,500, while a comparable Carrier/Lennox that qualified for the rebate was $13,500 (so back to $5,000 but dealing with the Greener Homes process) - in this case the Daikin was superior in every metric. When we initially looked at regular square AC units and nothing was remotely that expensive. But we opted for the heat pump because of the shoulder season and AC capabilities.

Slim units are also very efficient and very quiet, and require less space away from the wall which for us in a semi-detached/semi-attached/duplex/roommate housing situation, was ideal to still get the mower to the front yard. A square unit could fit but technically it's against code as it blocks a fire exit. The difference in price between a slim AC and slim heatpump was around $1,000 iirc.

[pheoxs]

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In our experience the heat pumps ended up being more expensive overall than just an AC unit despite the rebate. For example, the slim Daikin we went with after their factory rebates was $8,500, while a comparable Carrier/Lennox that qualified for the rebate was $13,500 (so back to $5,000 but dealing with the Greener Homes process) - in this case the Daikin was superior in every metric. When we initially looked at regular square AC units and nothing was remotely that expensive. But we opted for the heat pump because of the shoulder season and AC capabilities.

Slim units are also very efficient and very quiet, and require less space away from the wall which for us in a semi-detached/semi-attached/duplex/roommate housing situation, was ideal to still get the mower to the front yard. A square unit could fit but technically it's against code as it blocks a fire exit. The difference in price between a slim AC and slim heatpump was around $1,000 iirc.

Whats the efficiency of the two units? Would you make that back in savings over the long run?

[msommers]

Didn't bother to get into the nitty gritty when it was down to a $1,000 difference.

[arcticcat522]

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Who did you deal with? PM me. That's exactly what I'm after.

+1 seems like the correct way to do it.

[sabad66]

Has anyone run a nat gas furnace + heat pump? I have two original 80s era furnaces, with an a/c only on the upstairs furnace. I’m thinking of switching out my upstairs furnace to a heat pump, and then moving the a/c to my main floor gas furnace.

My thinking is that this way I’ll have a/c across the entire house in the summer instead of just my 2nd storey, and since hot air rises, keeping my main floor/basement furnace as gas will get me through these -35 cold snaps without tripling my electric bill.

It makes sense in my head but I’m sure I’m missing something. Thoughts?

[ExtraSlow]

You can have heat pump AND natural gas in the same furnace.