Heat Pump Installation in Virginia Beach, VA
A new system here will heat from November through April and cool from May through September every year. Tell us about the house, and a licensed contractor who covers Virginia Beach will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Your heat pump works nearly year round here
Virginia Beach asks for heat from November through April and cooling from May through September. That's 11 months a year your heat pump is doing one job or the other. Winter nights average 35°F, mild enough that a heat pump keeps up without much strain, and summer afternoons average 85°F on the other end.
A new split-system heat pump has to meet 14.3 SEER2 for cooling and 7.5 HSPF2 for heating if it was built on or after January 1, 2023. Nearly two thirds of homes here heat with electricity, and storms have knocked out power often enough that it's worth asking your contractor how the system you install handles an outage.
- 6 months
- November through April, your system heats
- 5 months
- May through September, it cools
- 35°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 85°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
Virginia requires HVAC contractors to hold a state license.
The Board for Contractors tests the contractor and keeps a record of them. The license belongs to the contractor, not to any one job, so it's the same license whether they're working on your heat pump or the one next door. Virginia carves out an exception for small jobs. Work under $1,000 doesn't need a licensed contractor at all, but a heat pump installation runs well past that.
For this job, the state license is what stands behind the work. That's on top of what the local building office does. Most cities and counties require a permit before an installation like this starts, and an inspection once it's done. The inspection is what checks the refrigerant lines, the wiring and the ductwork were put together right, separate from the license itself.
Sources: Virginia General Assembly · Virginia Department of Professional and Occupational Regulation
- Is a heat pump better than a furnace?
- It depends on what you're comparing it to and what you want it to do. A heat pump handles both heating and cooling from one system, where a furnace only heats, so you'd still need a separate air conditioner alongside it. Winters here average 35°F at night, which is well within the range a modern heat pump is built to handle. If you already have a furnace that's working fine, that's a separate decision from whether a heat pump makes sense for a new install or replacement.
- What's the difference between a heat pump and an air conditioner?
- An air conditioner only cools your home. A heat pump does the same cooling job in summer, but it can also run in reverse to heat your home in winter. Mechanically they're close cousins, both use a compressor and refrigerant to move heat rather than generate it, but the heat pump has a reversing valve that lets it pull heat from outside air and bring it indoors.
- Does a heat pump work in cold weather?
- Yes, a heat pump pulls heat from the outside air even when it's cold, since air still holds usable heat well below freezing. Winter nights here average 35°F, which is a range modern heat pumps are designed to run in without issue. Heat pumps do lose some efficiency as the temperature drops further, which is why some homes pair one with a backup heat source for the coldest stretches, but a contractor can tell you whether that's worth doing for your house.