One of the more annoying parts of heating or cooling your home is that a lot of the energy goes to waste. Many households have largely unused rooms, such as guest bedrooms, craft rooms, and offices, that don’t require constant climate control. Likewise, several rooms aren’t in use all day. One way to address this problem is to install a zoned HVAC.
What Is Zoned HVAC?
The idea behind a zoned HVAC is to target specific areas of your home for levels of heating and cooling. People set up zones in a variety of ways, but the main idea is to limit heating and cooling in designated areas. By doing so, you reduce the amount of energy that goes into unnecessarily maintaining the temperature in unused spaces.
Why Zone?
There are several reasons to set up zones in your home. As already noted, some rooms don’t get a lot of use.
Likewise, the heating and cooling needs of different parts of your house can be very unbalanced. A classic situation is when a home has a single side that faces the sun most of the day. With a single HVAC setup that tries to evenly distribute heating and cooling, the house will always have a hot side and a cool one. However, you can configure a sunward zone and a shady zone. The sunward zone will get less heat in winter and more cooling in the winter from the HVAC. Conversely, you can warm the cooler side more in the winter and cool it less in the summer.
The main benefit of this approach is that it balances out the temperature in your house more evenly. Your thermostats will trigger heating and cooling cycles less often in a balanced environment. That leads to lower HVAC operating costs, and it also reduces wear and tear.
Zoning also balances the comfort level throughout your home. One vent in your house might be quite a bit closer to the furnace, for example. Without any zoning, the closest vent is likely to blast a lot more hot air. This can make the associated room uncomfortably warm. If the thermostat is near the high-output vent, it can also encourage the HVAC to perform shorter and more frequent cycles.
Common Zoning Methods
There are numerous ways to configure a room as a zone or a part of a zone. One of the simplest solutions is a damper. A basic damper is a metal blade or plate that sits in the middle of an air duct. When the HVAC blows air throughout the vents, the damper reduces the airflow. This allows you to target a specific amount of air for heating and cooling to a designated zone.
Notably, there are more advanced dampers. Motorized dampers can rotate the blade, allowing you to change the airflow rate. Even better, some smart thermostats can communicate with motorized dampers. This allows them to automatically open or cut off airflow.
Your house might also have areas that aren’t getting enough air. For example, you could have a drafty spot in your home’s upstairs. The solution is typically to add a fan motor that can drive more airflow to that zone. Once more, there are ways to connect certain smart thermostats and fans to provide a highly adjustable solution.
Zone Thermostats
In a traditional unzoned heating setup, there is only one thermostat to set the temperature for the whole house. While zoning doesn’t require additional thermostats, it does open the opportunity for providing them for each zone. For example, a household member might need tighter climate control in their bedroom for medical reasons. You can equip their bedroom with its own HVAC zone and supporting thermostat. The smart technologies will then adjust the airflow to that room to target their preferences.
You can also target zones based on usage and time of day. For example, there isn’t much use in climate control for a living room when everyone is in bed or at work. At the same time, you might direct more climate control to the bedrooms at night.
Occupancy Sensors
Some modern smart technologies go a step further. Integrating occupancy sensors with zoning and a smart thermostat allows you to automatically adjust climate control to where it’s needed. Occupancy sensors might detect a large gathering in the dining room during a holiday dinner. The HVAC can reduce heating or cooling in other areas and focus on controlling the climate where people are.
Smart Vents and Retrofits
Some homeowners are reluctant to modify portions of the ductwork to accommodate things like dampers and fans. However, smart vents offer a convenient retrofit option. While they’re less common and somewhat less efficient, smart vents allow you to use motorized louvers to control airflow in individual rooms. Many models use wireless communication, allowing them to easily integrate with some smart thermostats that use technologies like Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
Efficiency Losses and Potential Utility Savings
Without zoning, a house can have some impressive temperature differences across different areas. Even in a home with good insulation, the upstairs could be easily 5 degrees Fahrenheit hotter, for example. If you’re trying to cool such a house in the summer, getting the upstairs cooler without zoning can require a lot of energy. However, targeting the upstairs as a different zone with greater airflow will significantly reduce the difference.
In many houses, the improvement in heating and cooling costs runs about 15%-25%. Depending on your home’s efficiency issues and zoning needs, that might yield savings of hundreds of dollars per year. Even with a complex HVAC zoning setup, the payback period for the investment is likely to be between three and seven years.
Even better, many zonal HVAC components will significantly outlast other parts of the HVAC. With proper maintenance, dampers often last for decades. Once zones are configured, they tend to be relatively low-cost in terms of maintenance and repairs. Our technicians frequently will need to lubricate moving parts during annual HVAC tune-ups. The job might also call for a small recalibration of the thermostat. Otherwise, you get the benefits of a paid-for zonal HVAC for years to come.
GMC Heating & Cooling Inc. puts more than 30 years of experience to work on HVAC projects. We provide help with heating and cooling jobs, including installations, repairs, upgrades, and replacements. You can even talk with us about indoor air quality issues. Our firm is also a trusted partner with major names like Amana, Rinnai, Bryant, and Aprilaire.
We have lots of specials regularly on our website. Also, qualified customers can finance installation work upon credit approval. Maintenance plans are available, too. We even provide 24/7 emergency HVAC service. You can check out reviews for our business on Yelp, Google, Facebook, and the BBB to see how much your friends and neighbors trust our skilled technicians. Our business is fully state-licensed, also.
If you’re curious about the benefits of adding zoned HVAC to your Canton, OH home, contact GMC Heating & Cooling Inc. today.
