Gas Furnace
With natural gas, you can warm your home efficiently while saving on your monthly energy bills, because gas is more economical than electricity and you will enjoy the comfort and the savings for years to come.
Unlike a heat pump, the efficiency of gas heating does not depend on outside temperatures, because it heats using an actual flame, so even when the outside temperature dips below 45 degrees, the gas furnace will still warm your home without using auxiliary electric resistance heat to maintain the warmth.
A natural gas furnace and electric central air conditioner combination is more reliable and easier to maintain than a heat pump, because it has half the working parts of an electric heat pump, so there are fewer parts to wear out and need replacement.
Warm air from a gas furnace is more comfortable than air from an electric heat pump, because air from a gas furnace is 20 to 30 degrees warmer than air from an electric heat pump, so you can expect more comfort from a gas furnace.
You will notice more warmth from a gas furnace, because air from the furnace will be distributed at temperatures around 120 degrees. Air from a heat pump is only about 95 degrees, which is actually a little cooler than your body temperature. So the gas furnace will deliver more of the kind of warmth you expect from a home heating system.
Gas furnaces are most effective at delivering indoor comfort, because the colder it gets outside the more it will do for you inside. With a gas heating system you don't have to worry about losing efficiency during a cold snap.
When it comes to heating your home during cold weather the gas furnace will greatly outperform a heat pump. Heat pumps perform best when the outside air is relatively warm—approximately between 45 and 50 degrees—and they lose the ability to deliver heat as the temperature drops, so if it actually gets cold outside, they lose their ability to heat.
Gas furnaces are more effective than heat pumps, because at very low temperatures an electric heat pump delivers hardly any heat at all, and it has to supplement its output with conventional electric heat, so you end up spending extra money to keep warm by using the most costly, least efficient heating method known.
With a gas furnace you don't have to worry about indoor wind chill, because the system is not moving cooler air around. Owners of electric heat pumps often complain about feeling cold, even when the outside temperature is at a comfortable level, because the heat pump is moving large quantities of air and creating drafts. Because this moving air is lower than your own body temperature, it makes you feel cold. In effect, the electric heat pump is introducing its own wind chill factor into your home. With a gas furnace you avoid those drafts-and any air that is circulating in your home is automatically much warmer when it comes from inside a gas furnace.
With a gas furnace you can create energy savings during the night, because a gas furnace can be set back to a lower temperature overnight and set up to normal in the morning-without wasting any fuel. An electric heat pump has to call on more expensive electric resistance heat to do the same job, so a gas furnace will always deliver that energy savings in real dollars.
Gas furnaces are not dependent on climate for their performance, because gas heat has the same efficiency everywhere. With a heat pump, the climate of the actual installed location determines how efficient the system will be, so by choosing a gas furnace you don't have to worry about how the system will perform in your particular climate or location.
You will always have a larger network of service support with a gas furnace, because there are more service personnel trained on gas technology than heat pump technology; it is a simpler technology to learn. So when you invest in a gas furnace you can be assured that there will always be trained personnel close at hand for your service calls.
Your up-front purchase of a gas furnace can be less expensive, because if you do not want or need air conditioning you don't have to buy it. With a heat pump, you do not have that option. With a gas system, you don't have any extra equipment to buy and you purchase only what you need to do the job.
Selecting a gas furnace allows you to separate the operation of your household heating and cooling systems; a tremendous advantage for you in customizing both systems to your needs. Each system can be exactly sized to your heating and cooling needs, so instead of the "one size fits all" approach of the electric heat pump, you get just the right heating system and just the right cooling system.
