Many HVAC technicians receive phone calls, texts, and the worried questions of friends filled with concern over how the fluctuating temperatures are harming the HVAC systems.  It’s true that the weather has been more than a little atypical over the past few years, but it is nothing that your HVAC system can’t handle.

Even in the warmer months when you may need heat one day and cooling the next, most systems are perfectly capable of keeping up with no more than the regular day-to-day wear and tear.  And, in the winter, most systems will have no trouble adjusting to maintain your space when it is 10 degrees one day and fifty degrees the next.

There are, however, ways to ensure that your system is running at tip top efficiency, even during these periods of temperature fluctuation.  For instance, your system should be working much harder on a ten degree day, but it doesn’t need to run at full speed on the fifty degree day.  This is where sensors and controls come into play, which is exactly why the market is growing so rapidly right now.  Homeowners are beginning to understand the potential energy savings that can be achieved by retrofitting existing systems with the right controls.   Energy savings means cost savings and that makes the upgrades entirely worthwhile.

Outdoor air temperature sensors can be used to gauge how much heating or cooling is needed to maintain indoor temperatures.  Feeding that information from the sensor to specialized controls, the system can be ramped up and slowed down accordingly, automatically.

It is very apparent that we aren’t going to be seeing the steady temperatures that some remember from years past.  The fluctuations aren’t going to harm your system, but you might be able to improve the efficiency of your heating and cooling if you upgrade the system with sensors and controls.