Warm Up to Winter Savings

Provincial rebates make home heating upgrades more affordable than ever

There’s no good time for a furnace to go out, but for Louise Marcoff there could hardly have been a worse time. It was after hours on New Year’s Eve when she returned from a walk and realized her house was unusually cold. Her husband was working overseas and she suspected repairmen would be hard to reach on the most celebrated night of the year. Luckily, she had a neighbour in the heating business who came to the rescue.

A quick fix was all it took to get the furnace running again. But two days later she heard an almighty bang. The furnace was out again.

Louise had had enough.

Louise in front of her home heated by a high efficiency furnace.

“I was scared that the house would burn up,” she said. “I asked my neighbour to get me the most top-of-the-line, high efficiency furnace he could.”

Within a few days she had replaced her 30-year-old gas furnace with a new model that has an annual fuel utilization rating (AFUE) of 95 per cent and a variable-speed motor.  Her old furnace, by comparison, had an AFUE rating of only 40 to 60 per cent.

“With every dollar you spend on a 40 per cent efficient furnace, 60 cents of that is going out the roof,” explains JD Rohl, Energy Management Consultant with Direct Energy, “When you get a 95 per cent efficient furnace, only 5 cents are going out the roof.”

Not surprisingly, Louise quickly began to notice a 40 per cent reduction on her energy bills. And although she couldn’t tell, she was also reducing her annual greenhouse gas emissions by at least 1.4 tonnes annually.

Louise reaped additional rewards by participating in Alberta’s energy efficiency rebates program. The provincial government offers $500 to homeowners who upgrade to an ENERGY STAR®-qualified furnace that has a DC variable-speed motor and an efficiency rating of at least 92 per cent. More than 6000 Albertans have already taken advantage of the rebate, obtaining rewards of $400 to $600, depending on the type of furnace or boiler they purchase.

Participants can complement their provincial rebate with an additional $625 from the federal government’s ecoENERGY Retrofit Program. To qualify for the federal grant homeowners must have an independent energy evaluation before and after making any upgrades.

When shopping for a new furnace look for one that has an ENERGY STAR label and an AFUE rating of 92 to 97 per cent. Models with DC motors help cut electricity consumption by about one third.

“It’s worth it to get high efficiency,” encourages Rohl, who says almost all of the furnaces he installs fall into that category. “Between the federal ecoENERGY Retrofit rebates, the provincial rebates, and also the tax credit, a high efficiency furnace can become cheaper than a mid efficiency furnace.”

Natural Resources Canada has announced that, as of December 31, 2009, any new furnace manufactured must be at least 90 per cent efficient. Consumers should be aware that mid-efficiency furnaces (which have AFUE ratings of 78 to 84 per cent) will still be available for purchase as vendors offload old stock; however, with better technology available these less efficient options are best avoided.

Louise’s new furnace may have cost her $4100 (before rebates), but she calculates that she’ll recoup the costs in energy savings within 18 months. She advises other homeowners to upgrade now or risk coming home to a cold house in the middle of winter.

“If you have a really old furnace, don’t wait until you’re in my position,” she says, “If for nothing else, it really is worth it to change to a high efficiency, just for the money you’re going to save.”

Click here to get a high efficiency furnace for less.