Heating and cooling in Savannah
Savannah's old neighborhoods, newer suburbs and island homes all share the same problem: long, muggy summers that push air conditioning hard, and enough winter cold that the heating side can't be an afterthought. A good system here is sized carefully and set up to dry the air, not just chill it.
Design temperatures
NOAA's engineering weather data for the Savannah station, at 49 feet above sea level, gives a 1% summer design temperature of 93°F with a mean coincident wet-bulb of 77°F, and a 99% winter design temperature of 30°F. Those numbers belong in a room-by-room load calculation. Ask for one, and ask what values it used.
A long humid season
NOAA counts about 1,902 hours a year at Savannah with the wet-bulb temperature above 73°F, and about 3,539 hours above 67°F. Moisture is half the cooling job. Oversized equipment short-cycles, the coil never gets cold for long enough to pull much water out, and rooms feel clammy at a low thermostat setting. Ask how the proposed system handles humidity, whether a variable-speed blower is included, and how the fan will be set.
Older homes and crawlspaces
Many Savannah houses sit over vented crawlspaces or have ducts squeezed into attics and chases that were never meant for them. Leaky returns in a damp crawlspace draw in humid air and can carry musty odors through the house. Ask the contractor to inspect the ducts, test them for leakage if possible and quote sealing and insulation as separate line items.
Winter heating
With a 99% design temperature of 30°F, heat pumps carry most Savannah homes through winter, but the cold mornings are real. Ask how much heat the system delivers near freezing, what backup heat it has and how the thermostat will control it.
Efficiency rules
Georgia is in the Department of Energy's hot-humid Southeast region. Split-system central air conditioners installed on or after January 1, 2023 must be rated at least 14.3 SEER2 (13.8 SEER2 for 45,000 Btu/h and larger), and split-system heat pumps must meet 14.3 SEER2 and 7.5 HSPF2. Ask for the operating-cost difference between the options you are offered.
Storms
NOAA lists a 50-year basic wind speed of 110 mph and a 100-year rainfall rate of 4.3 inches per hour for Savannah. The National Hurricane Center recorded 17.48 inches of rain at Hunter Army Airfield from Hurricane Matthew in 2016. Ask how the outdoor unit will be mounted and anchored, whether it should sit higher on a flood-prone lot, and where the condensate and any pump discharge will drain in heavy rain.
Before you sign
Georgia licensing rules for residential work could not be checked against the state's own site for this page, so ask the contractor directly which Georgia license covers the job and check it with the Secretary of State's license lookup. Ask each bidder for model numbers, ratings, the load calculation, duct work, permit and warranty terms in writing.