Companies Touting System Efficiency Find Opportunities in the HVAC Residential Space

The way Dick Foster sees it, his company has nowhere to go but up in the residential HVAC market. 

Foster is the president of ZoneFirst, which makes dampers, thermostats, and controls for HVAC zoning systems, which can improve comfort and efficiency by directing conditioned air to where it’s needed when it’s needed — and also ensuring that it doesn’t go where it would be wasted. 

While roughly a million single-family homes are built in the U.S. each year, HVAC zoning is installed in less than 5%, Foster said at the ZoneFirst booth at the AHR Expo in Orlando, Florida.  

“So for us, there’s just unlimited potential,” he said. 

In the retrofit market, between 10 million and 11 million HVAC units — furnaces, air conditioners, etc. — are replaced in the country annually, but fewer than half a million zoning systems are installed, he said. “Simple math,” Foster said, means much opportunity. 

ZoneFirst’s technology can be installed in retrofits in a way that doesn’t involve cutting into drywall or ductwork. Dampers can be placed at the room outlets and wired to a control panel, which is connected to a thermostat for each zone. The control panel signals each damper to open, or close, according to what its thermostat is calling for. 

Foster described how ZoneFirst can address a summertime comfort problem — a cool downstairs, but sweltering upstairs at night — typical of a two-story home in which a single thermostat is downstairs in the living area. 

“It’s a distribution issue. We just need to move the air,” he said. “When you’re in your master bedroom and it’s still 80°, but your living room is 60, you know, we need to shut off the downstairs and push the air upstairs. So, how can you do that? If you can’t do it in the trunk line, you do it at the outlet.” 

ZoneFirst even offers a light switch thermostat (LST) that can be used to adjust the damper in a room as well as to turn lights on and off. And ZoneFirst’s wireless Bliss system allows users to access all the home’s thermostats remotely via an app on a smartphone. 

“Zoning itself is a comfort thing. It should be an automatic, but it’s the least-used tool that contractors have to solve comfort problems,” Foster said. 

People today even have temperature-control zoning in their vehicles, Foster noted. 

“Get into a Lexus, and they’ve got four zones at that point,” he said. “So people have zoning in their cars, but they don’t have it in their own home.” 

Here’s what some other companies represented at the Expo are doing in the residential market this year: 

GE Appliances 

GE Appliances is investing big in heat pump technology in order to make further inroads in the residential HVAC market. 

The Expo saw a launch party for the company’s new Connect Series line of cold-climate, side-discharge heat pumps. Connect heat pumps are for ducted systems, can be used in new construction or in system replacements, and are compatible with GE Appliances air handlers, coils, and natural-gas furnaces, as well as with third-party equipment and most 24V thermostats. 

Heat pumps in the Connect Series are available in 2-, 3-, 4-, and 5-ton capacities. 

“This is one that we’re expecting to see a tremendous amount of energy around, going into the year,” said Andrew Twitty, director of product management for unitary HVAC at GE Appliances Air and Water Solutions.

ONLY CONNECT: A GE Appliances Connect side-discharge heat pump, for ducted systems, with a clear front panel to reveal its interior construction. The Connect is a cold-climate heat pump with efficiency ratings of up to 19 SEER2 and 10 HSPF2. (Staff photo)

Connect heat pumps have inverter rotary compressors and efficiency ratings of up to 19 SEER2 and 10 HSPF2. They can provide 95% of heating capacity at an outdoor temperature of 5°F and can continue providing some heat when it’s as low as -22°F outside, Twitty said. They’re compatible with furnaces for dual-fuel systems, including with GE’s new 98% efficient gas furnace. 

The Connect line was developed for northern regions that experience extended cold weather, Twitty said. 

“We’re just continuing to invest in innovation in this space, driving some of the electrification efforts that are happening in Canada, that are obviously happening in states like California, in the Northwest, but then also in the Northeast,” he said. 

GE also has a sizeable lineup of ductless heat-pump products, both for single-zone and multizone systems that can handle up to five zones. Ductless products are available in up to 4 tons of capacity. 

The Endure is the top-of-the-line ductless, with the single-zone model offering 100% of heating capacity at an ambient temperature of 5°F and continuous operation when it’s as low as -31°F. It’s rated at up to 27 SEER2 and up to 11 HSPF2. 

The multi-zone Endure provides 95% of capacity at 5°F and continuous operation down to -22°F. Its efficiency ratings are up to 23 SEER2 and 10.5 HSPF2. Multizone heat pumps can be mixed and matched with different kinds of indoor units: high-wall units, consoles, or cassettes. 

Mars 

Mars, a master distributor of Midea heat pumps under the Century and ComfortAire brands, is finding dividends in the residential heat pump market. 

“We’ve seen high double-digit growth year over year,” said Joel Stevens, director of product development at Mars, when asked about the amount of interest in its heat pumps coming from the residential sector. 

The company, which distributes its products throughout the U.S. and Canada, has its strongest U.S. presence in the Northeast and the West, Stevens said, and is working to develop its footprint in the Southeast. 

Models in Mars’ VCD series, Stevens said, are considered cold-climate heat pumps, offering up to 100% of rated capacity at -5°F and up to 75% of capacity at -22°F. 

MASTER DISTRIBUTOR: Mars carries products from different OEMS, branded with its Century and ComfortAire labels. (Staff photo)

Available in six capacities for ducted systems, ranging from 18,000 Btuh to 55,000 Btuh, the VCD outdoor units are rated at between 15.3 and 18 SEER2 and between 8.9 and 10 HSPF4 2. 

“This could be used nationwide. Even in Canada, they love this unit,” Stevens said. 

Mars also offers the LE Series heat pumps, with single-stage compressors helping to achieve ratings of up to 16.9 SEER2 and 9 HSPF2, and inverter compressors boosting the SEER2 to up to 19. They are also for ducted HVAC systems. 

The Mars CMA-SA series of horizontal-discharge a/c condensing units, offered in six capacities ranging from 24,000 Btuh to 48,000 Btuh, are less expensive and quieter than top-discharge models. They all feature inverter compressors, and have efficiency ratings of between 15.2 and 16 SEER2. 

ClimateMaster Inc.  

Energy-efficiency incentives, greater public awareness, and economic decisions by builders, utilities, homeowners, and would-be homeowners are helping ClimateMaster Inc. gain traction in the residential geothermal market. 

That’s according to Joe Parsons, senior marketing sustainability manager at Climate Control Group, of which ClimateMaster is a part. 

ClimateMaster manufactures equipment for geothermal systems, from ground-source and water-source heat pumps to controls, thermostats, and devices that help the components of a system communicate with each other. 

AWARD WINNER: The EnviroKit from Climate Control Group, an array of components that can be installed to improve the performance of an aging vertical stack fan coil unit. The EnviroKit won a 2025 AHR Expo Innovation Award in the cooling category. (Staff photo)

Products include the Tranquility 30 SP Premier indoor split system. Available in sizes from 2 tons to 5 tons, the Tranquility 30 SP Premier has two-stage compressors and electronically commutated (EC) fan motors. The system exceeds ASHRAE 90.1 efficiency standards, offering an average coefficient of performance (COP) of 3.79 and an average energy efficiency ratio (EER) of 17.74. ClimateMaster recommends it for either new construction or residential retrofits. 

The EnviroKit, which won a 2025 AHR Expo Innovation Award in the cooling category, is a set of components that can be installed in an older vertical stack fan coil unit in order to improve its performance. It’s recommended for multifamily housing, among other applications. 

“Because it is easy to install with minimal disruption, EnviroKit provides a transformative solution that aligns with Climate Control Group’s commitment to efficient HVAC technology delivered with sustainable and simple solutions,” said Shane Lantz, strategic markets leader at International Environmental Corp., which is also part of the Climate Control Group. 

Despite the uncertainty around federal Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) Incentives, Parsons said that some 26 states have their own efficiency incentive programs, and that those programs are driving interest in geothermal. 

Parsons said he’s also seen growing interest in neighborhood-level residential geothermal projects, mostly for new subdivisions, in places like Texas, and in geothermal as HVAC system replacements in states in the Northeast. 

He’s also seen utilities investing in ownership of the ground loops for residential geothermal systems, which eases the financial burden on homeowners, as loop construction is the most expensive part of a geothermal project. The utility then charges its ground-loop customers a monthly fee, much like it would for electricity or natural gas. 

“The utility recovers their investment after eight years,” Parsons said. 

Fujitsu General America 

The residential heat pump market in the U.S. is in its infancy, and the folks at Fujitsu General America have taken notice. 

The fact that a low proportion of homes currently use heat pumps, coupled with improvements that enable newer heat pumps to run more efficiently, and more effectively in cold climates, plus environmental regulations and electrification incentives, add up to wide-open opportunities, said Tom Tuohy, regional sales manager at Fujitsu and a former HVAC contractor. 

“Right now, a lot of what’s going in with heat pumps is brand new. People didn’t have it,” Tuohy said. “We’re taking our fossil fuels, we’re putting in heat pumps.” 

MARKET OPPORTUNITIES: The outdoor unit of a Fujitsu Airstage XLTH+ heat pump system. The XLTH is short for Extra-Low-Temperature Heating. (Staff photo)

Contractors, Tuohy said, are seizing opportunities for heat pumps in the residential space because of the replacement business they’ll get every 10 to 15 years after that first installation. 

“It’s exponential moving forward,” Tuohy added. “So you can have replacement market, and the new market running wild for the next 10, 20 years.” 

Fujitsu, which has been making heat pumps for decades, has products to meet the moment. 

The Airstage XLTH heat pump, available in sizes between 1.5 and 4 tons, can provide 100% of its rated heating capacity at an outdoor temperature as low as -15°F; one model, the XLTH+ (the letters stand for Extra-Low-Temperature Heating) can even offer 90% of its capacity at -22°F, Tuohy said. 

The company has XLTH models for both single-zone and multizone systems, with the multizone supporting up to five indoor units. All Fujitsu heat pumps have inverter compressors for greater efficiency, and XLTH models have ratings of up to 33.1 SEER. 

Fujitsu makes a variety of indoor units for its mini-split systems: wall-mounted, floor mounted, ceiling cassettes, and a slim-duct model. The indoor units offer a range of capacities — wall-mounted units, for example, come in six capacities, ranging from 7,000 Btuh to 24,000 Btuh — and can be mixed and matched within a home while being connected to the same outdoor unit. 

“We’re growing every year, and we have numbers that we anticipate reaching, very generous numbers that we anticipate reaching within the next five years,” Tuohy said.