AC Installation in Columbia, MO
A new air conditioner in Columbia will run from May through September every year. Tell us about the house, and a licensed contractor who covers Boone County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Five months of Columbia summer heat on one system
Columbia asks for cooling from May through September, and summer afternoons here average 86°F. That is five months a year your air conditioner has to keep up, not just a few hot weeks.
Boone County has also seen its share of hail and wind, 19 hail events and 54 damaging wind events over the past ten years, with hail up to 2.75 inches recorded. An outdoor unit sits exposed to that. If you're installing new, anything built since 2023 has to meet a federal minimum of 13.4 SEER2, so a properly sized, efficient system is the starting point either way.
- 5 months
- May through September, your air conditioner is on duty
- 86°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
- 19 hail events
- in ten years, and hail bends the fins on outdoor coils
- 13.4 SEER2
- the federal minimum any new unit must meet
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A higher-efficiency unit would save about $30 a year to run in Boone County compared with a new unit at the federal minimum.
Estimates for a typical Boone County home, from EIA household energy data, Missouri fuel prices and NOAA climate normals. Your home will differ.
- What size air conditioner does my house need?
- There's no number to give you without a proper look at the house. Sizing comes down to the square footage, how much shade the house gets, how many windows it has and which way they face, and how well the attic and walls hold heat. A contractor will run a load calculation, usually called a Manual J, to work this out room by room. Putting in a unit that's too big cools the air fast but shuts off before it pulls the moisture out, so the house feels clammy even though the thermostat says it's cool. That matters here, where summer afternoons average 86°F for five months of the year, since an oversized unit will short cycle right through the worst of that heat instead of running long enough to dry the air out.
- Should I replace the whole system or just the outdoor unit?
- If the indoor coil and outdoor unit weren't designed to run together, replacing just the outdoor unit usually causes more problems than it solves. The two are matched for the refrigerant charge and airflow the system needs, and pairing a new condenser with an old coil often means the system never reaches the efficiency it's rated for. Age matters too. If the indoor coil is old enough that it's near the end of its life anyway, many contractors will recommend doing both at once. A contractor can look at what you have and tell you whether the coil is worth keeping.
- Do HVAC contractors in Columbia need a state license to work on my home?
- A licensed HVAC contractor should be doing this work on your home. Ask to see the license number before work starts. Any central air conditioner installed new has to meet a federal efficiency minimum of 13.4 SEER2, and a licensed contractor is who makes sure the equipment and the installation meet that standard.