Central Heating: The Way to Go for Energy Efficiency!

You have your home all snugly tight with the right amount of insulation in all the right places and you turn on the heat and the room heats up, but... the kitchen is still cold; you need a central heating system of some kind.

The central heating systems are some of the most efficient systems because they generate the heat and then pump it all over the house in the same proportions that you select. That way, the rooms that are being used gets the most heat and the rooms that are not being used gets quite a bit less or none at all depending on their usage.

The central heating system's boiler or heating unit is contained in the garage or basement and the ducts are run under the house or through the ceiling to come out in each room and you can even add a humidifier or de-humidifier to the entire system to allow those important functions as well. That makes a very good investment in your home and may increase the sales price, if and when necessary, all that much more.

When you are looking for a central heating system for your home, you need to ask yourself some questions that will help the contractor position the correct unit in there that will be big enough but not too big. Those questions would be:

•     Are you in an area that is normally fairly cold or fairly hot?
•     Is your home on a cement pad or is there enough room under it to install the ducting that is needed?
•     Do you want floor vents or wall venting to inject the heating into your individual rooms?
•     Do you need to have ceiling vents?
•     Is your home insulated? Without insulation, you will need a larger unit right from the start.
•     What types of walls do you have?

These and several more will be asked of you by the contractor before they can offer any suggestions and the answers are very important. You are also going to want to check the energy efficiency ratings of the units that you settle on. There are the Energy Star ratings as well as the BTUs ratings and the SEER ratings. These are all very important as they can affect any tax advantages that you may accrue due to the Greening of your home in accordance with many of the local regulations around the world.

Since the most efficient space heater will only have about a 70 -75 % efficiency rating, you are wasting a lot of energy with the system you have, now, and that is just not going to be good enough when the electrical rates start to make the move up that they all are going to do in the next several years, so a move to a much more efficient system is just going to be the right move for you to make.

The energy efficient central heating system is the right move and the savings will not only be with you, this year, but also for years to come and the resale value will only improve. If you are not mad keen on ducted air, then an under floor water heating system would be another very good option to consider.

Mike reveals more about the advantages and disadvantages of Central Heating Systems here.