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Summer Energy Savings Tips for Your Residential HVAC System

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Have your energy costs risen with the South Florida summer temperatures? If they have, you should look into ways you can save energy. While blasting the air conditioning might seem like a good idea on a 95-degree day, you should consider your energy bills and your environmental impact first. Here are several tips for staying cool in the Florida heat while reducing your energy costs:

Use Preventive Maintenance

Having your heating and air conditioning system serviced regularly is called preventive maintenance. Waiting until your system suffers a major breakdown to have it serviced is called reactive maintenance. Engaging in preventative maintenance will keep your system working throughout the summer and in the long run. This type of maintenance involves checking on and fixing small problems before they become large ones. That includes:

  • Changing your air filters every month, or at least at the beginning of every season. This will improve the air quality in your home and prevent dust and allergens from causing health and breathing problems for you and your family.
  • Having the coils and fans professionally cleaned. This will improve your system’s energy efficiency.
  • Sealing the ducts in your home. This prevents air leaks that decrease your system’s efficiency.

While you can perform some of these tasks yourself, such as changing out the air filters, some require professional residential HVAC services, like the ones we offer. Hiring an HVAC services company to inspect and service your system regularly means your system will be serviced safely by a licensed technician. While you will have to spend money to hire these professional services, you will ultimately save money in the long run because you won’t have to hire professionals for many larger, more expensive repairs.

Keep the Air Moving

Instead of blasting your central air conditioner at its highest level, you can use it at a more moderate level and use ceiling fans to keep the air moving. To do this, you should keep doors open between rooms in your home. This will help the cool air travel freely between rooms, whereas closed doors would keep the air trapped in specific rooms.

Install a Programmable Thermostat

Using a programmable thermostat, such as Sensi, gives you greater control over your energy consumption. You can use a zoned cooling system, which is a room-by-room thermostat that comes with one multi-zone controller. With this system, you can set different rooms to different temperatures. So you can set an empty bedroom zone to a higher temperature, such as 80 degrees, while you can set the fully occupied living room zone to 73 degrees.

Use Window Treatments

While this tip doesn’t directly involve your HVAC system, it’s an additional way to keep your home cool. Having your windows treated with solar film will block out the brightest rays during summer and help keep your home cool before you even have to touch the thermostat. You can also put up curtains, drapes, blinds, or thermal-backed shades and keep them closed during the hottest periods of the day.

South Florida Residential HVAC Services

If you are interested in using preventive HVAC maintenance to help keep your house cool this summer, contact us today. We can fix small HVAC problems before they grow larger, but we also offer residential and commercial HVAC emergency services in case a major breakdown does occur.

South Florida HVAC

Preparing Your South Florida HVAC System for Summer

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As temperatures rise and humidity thickens the air, it’s time to start preparing your HVAC system for summer. What steps should you take to do that? In this post, we’ll outline some tips you can add to your preventative maintenance checklist.

Change Out Air Filters

This is one of the most cost-effective steps you can take to prepare your cooling system for summer. Changing your air filters monthly, or at least at the beginning of every season, will prevent dust and dirty air from building up in your HVAC system, which will save you money on service fees and energy bills in the long run. Taking this HVAC preventive maintenance step will improve the building’s air quality and your system’s energy efficiency. Cleaning out the air filters also can reduce allergens, so you won’t have to suffer through allergic reactions all spring and summer.

Install a Programmable Thermostat

A programmable thermostat, such as Sensi or NEST, can learn your building’s cooling patterns and adjust your HVAC system accordingly. This means the thermostat will customize the way it runs so your HVAC system doesn’t waste energy trying to cool your building in a way that doesn’t fit.

Insulate and Seal Air Ducts

Checking your air ducts can become part of your annual maintenance, and it definitely should become part of your summer preparation maintenance. If your air ducts are leaking, that could be costing you extra in your energy bills and your cooling and heating system service costs. Sealing and insulating your air ducts will help your HVAC system run more efficiently over longer periods of time.

Schedule an Air Conditioning Maintenance Appointment

While you can take your own steps to keep your system working well, some tasks are best left to the professionals. Scheduling a maintenance visit will give you a chance to find out if your HVAC system has critical problems that need fixing before temperatures really soar. The maintenance appointment should include specific HVAC maintenance measures, such as inspecting machine parts and checking refrigerant levels.
This is the summer preparation step where your system would most benefit from an HVAC preventive maintenance program. At Garrison Mechanical, we perform monthly HVAC service checks as part of our HVAC preventive maintenance contracts. Regular maintenance keeps your HVAC system from developing preventable problems, which is why having a preventative maintenance plan in place is always a good idea. With a preventative maintenance agreement in place, you can have peace of mind knowing your system will be ready for summer and won’t experience any breakdowns when you need cool air the most.

Prepare for Summer with Garrison Mechanical

If you’re ready to prepare your HVAC system for summer or you have questions about the preparation process, contact us today. Centrally located in Pembroke Pines, we perform commercial and residential preventive maintenance. We can work with you to customize an HVAC program that will fit your business’s or your home’s needs.