Welsch Heating & Cooling Co. Assists a Disabled Veteran

We wanted to take this opportunity to talk about a custom home that we recently completed. We were approached by Jeremiah and Kristy DeGuire, a relative of Brian Grainger one of our service technicians, about doing the HVAC for a custom home for them. They chose Stockell Custom Homes, an Energy Star Builder, to build the house for them. We got along great with Don Stockell and his organization right off of the bat. During the process of putting our pricing together I learned that Jeremiah was a veteran and was also disabled. Their dream was to build a super-efficient home and were very interested in geothermal heat pumps for heating and air conditioning the home. When I talked to our GeoComfort geothermal heat pump sales representative Ed Davis about the project he generously gave the DeGuires a substantial discount on the equipment. They also wanted to get the home Energy Star certified and Stockell helped them to get certified by paying the certification fees, working on the Thermal Enclosure and Water Management systems at no charge to the DeGuires. To get the HVAC energy star certified there are several extra steps to take when installing the ductwork and after completion to verify that we have complied with all of the rules. A couple of the main things are to seal all of the ductwork with mastic so that there are no air leaks around the joints and seams in the ductwork. We also have to duct the returns. This means that we cannot use the building cavities to carry the return air as is common practice. In addition to these steps we have to commission the equipment after completion, perform an airflow balance and fill out a “checklist” from energy star. We installed a fresh water humidifier and an Aprilaire 1510 high efficiency air cleaner to improve the indoor air quality. We installed zoning to improve the temperature control and increase the comfort level. We ran an operating cost estimate for what it would take to heat and air condition the home with standard construction techniques with conventional equipment and compared that to using GeoComfort equipment with the upgraded insulation and air sealing required in an Energy Star home and the results are pretty dramatic. If the DeGuires had built the same house with standard construction we would expect to see an annual operating cost for the HVAC of $2,271.00 per year and with Energy Star and geothermal it drops to $830.00 per year. Overall it was a great experience and we are certain that the DeGuires will enjoy the benefits from this system for many years to come.