ASI's About Dual Fuel Hybrid Heating Systems Control
Ameri-Serv, Inc. Heating and Cooling - HVAC Sales, Service, Repair, Installation & Consumer Information
Dual Fuel or Hybrid Heating Systems Control Considerations
What must be considered when installing any hybrid dual fuel system is the fact that the high air temperatures leaving the gas, propane or oil furnace can and will damage the refrigeration system of the heat pump if the two systems are operated together at specific times.
The location of the indoor coil is important in that if it is ahead of the gas, propane or oil furnace heat exchanger, in other words the cold air entering the system hits the indoor coil first, then the heat pump can be used to it's maximum potential without much worry and standard heat pump control will work fine.
The control measure taken are very important as certain safeguards must be taken to protect your hybrid dual fuel system. Fortunately many of the systems today are designed to be operated as a dual fuel hybrid system and many of these safeguards are built right in as part of the packaged system.
If the indoor coil is downstream of the heat exchanger on your dual fuel system then there must be some sort of control to prevent the two units from running the gas and heat pump at the same time, another factor to consider is the actual amount of heat transfer available, in other words it does not continue to be economical to run the heat pump below a specific outdoor air temperature because it's heat output decreases as the temperature drops outside and the cost of the actual heat energy being produced goes up.
Plus the heated air passing through the coil can not accept any more heat from the indoor coil because heat energy transfers from hot to cold only. If the air passing through is hotter than the coil no heat transfer will take place other than in reverse.
A heat pump is at it's peak efficiency when it changes the air temperature 20 deg or better, as this number slowly drops in relation to the outdoor air temperature it becomes less and less efficient. When this number drops down below 10 deg F the efficiency may be at a point that it no longer beats the secondary heat source (gas, propane or oil). This simply depends on the cost of the fuel at this point, if you are running gas you may want to shut down the heat pump between 12 and 15 deg F of change, while with propane or oil you may want to take this number down further to between 5 and 10 deg F.
There are many solutions if your system does not have the newest dual fuel hybrid controls built in. There are programmable thermostats that can have the outdoor air added to them and the thermostat operating in heat pump mode can switch from one source to the other or operate them together.
Newer programmable thermostats even have dual dual hybrid options built right into their set up. A simple heat pump unit also may have an outdoor thermostat built right in or one can be installed, this can also be set up to run one at a time or both at the same time. Either solution works fine as long as the location of the indoor coil and the cost per energy unit are considered.
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