Basic, Professional or Premium: Which Installation Package Fits Your Building

Buying an air purification unit is the easy part. The question that actually shapes your budget and your calendar is who puts it in the duct. Clean Science Solutions offers three installation packages in New York, called Basic, Professional and Premium, and they sit on a simple ladder: the more of the work your own people can do, the less you need from us.

The three packages in one glance

• Basic: installation consulting that supports your team as they install the units themselves.
• Professional: consulting and research to mark the exact locations within your HVAC where the units should go.
• Premium: complete end-to-end installation, including the electrical set-up.

The company doesn't publish a price list for these packages. What it does say is that each product is less than $.20 a square foot and that the installation packages and service options are set to meet your needs, with quotes coming from an in-person appointment. So treat what follows as a way to choose the right tier, not to estimate a dollar figure.

Basic: you do the work, we back you up

Basic is a self-install with support. It suits a building that already has people comfortable working on mechanical equipment: a facilities team, a building engineer, a mechanical contractor you already trust. They'll handle the physical installation, and Clean Science Solutions consults so the units end up installed correctly rather than just installed.

This is the natural fit for a smaller property with a capable maintenance person, or for a facilities department that prefers to keep all work on its own equipment in house. The trade is that the schedule and the labor are yours. If your team is already stretched, a self-install can sit at the bottom of the to-do list for weeks.

Professional: your hands, our map

Professional is for teams who can do the physical work but don't want to guess where the units belong. The package covers consulting and research to mark the location within your HVAC for each unit. As we noted in our piece on fan schedules, placement isn't arbitrary. The company says in-HVAC units go on the supply side, near the source, to treat fresh inlet air. Deciding which part of a duct system that means in your building takes someone who has studied your drawings and looked at the equipment.

Professional tends to suit a mid-sized office or a property manager who has a mechanical contractor on call. The contractor does the cutting and mounting. The marked locations tell them exactly where. You avoid paying for full installation while still getting an engineer's judgment on the part that's hardest to get right.

Premium: one team from start to finish

Premium is complete, end-to-end installation, and it includes the electrical set-up. If your building has no in-house capacity for mechanical work, or if the project spans multiple floors, or if you simply don't want to coordinate trades, this is the one that takes the whole job off your desk.

For larger projects, Clean Science Solutions has partnered with Edison Energy, LLC to help coordinate installations. The company describes Edison Energy as bringing large-scale project experience and a national footprint, which matters if you manage several properties and want one approach across all of them rather than a different story in each city.

Questions that point you to the right tier

• Do you have someone on staff who works on ductwork and mechanical equipment regularly? If yes, Basic is worth a serious look.
• Does your team know the building's air systems well but not the right spots for purification units? That points to Professional.
• Does the work need new electrical connections, and do you lack an electrician on call? Premium includes the electrical set-up.
• Are you coordinating many units, many floors or many properties? Premium's end-to-end scope and the Edison Energy partnership are built for that.
• How soon do you need the units running? A package that leaves the work with a busy in-house team may take longer than one where the installer owns the schedule.

How timing figures into the choice

The company says units are delivered in 2 to 4 weeks depending on availability, and that installation runs at roughly 3 to 4 units per day. Depending on how many units your building needs, installation takes anywhere from one day to a few weeks. Expedited installation is available at additional cost. A quick bit of arithmetic helps: a 20-unit project at 3 to 4 units a day is about five to seven working days for a dedicated crew. If your own staff can only spare a couple of hours a day, the same project stretches much longer, and that's worth weighing when you compare Basic with Premium.

Starting with an assessment, whichever you choose

You don't have to pick a package before you talk to anyone. The assessment comes first: an engineer visits your space, reviews the fan schedule and the physical HVAC structures, and tells you which units fit and what installation work they require. That visit is also where you learn which package your building really needs, because the answer depends on what the engineer finds in the ductwork, not on a sales sheet.

To compare the three packages for your own building, send a quote request through the site or call Clean Science Solutions at (917) 407-5822, available 24 hours a day.