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jbrown84
Registered Users
Posts:25
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| 05/16/2008 7:28 PM |
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I'm building a home in CT, and will be using radiant heat on all floors and a geothermal system. Would it be better to generate electricity for the heat pump or use a solar thermal system to provide hot water for domestic HW? I have about 300 SF of roof space to do this?
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Brock
Registered Users
Posts:169
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| 05/17/2008 10:14 AM |
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| Solar hot water typically has a "payback" about 2 to 3 times quicker then solar electric in any given area. Some other outside factors can change that a bit, but I have never seen solar electric with a quicker payback then solar hot water. |
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Green Bay, WI. - geothermal heated indoor pool with a small solar setup |
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Eric Friedland
Registered Users
Posts:4
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| 05/18/2008 12:44 AM |
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You can do what I did.
550 sf of unglazed, Swiss stainless collectors.
I have two heat storages. Inside 800 gallons with heat exchangers inside (STSS tank around $3,000 with tanks from Penn.) and 4,000 gallon tank burried, outside.
During the spring, summer, fall, I use the 800 gallon tank.
During the winter, I run the outside, buried tank with low temperatures and use a heat pump to extract heat from it and heat the 800 gallon tank. The outside tank termpatures are low and the panels become efficient at heating it during the winter.
I would increase the size of the outside storage though.
Eric in Seattle, cold, cloudy. |
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