Hey Guys,

I would love to hear from everyone / anyone who has evaluated and then installed various sustainable heating, cooling and power creation products etc.

Please let me know what you thought before using / installing the product and then your thoughts after using that product. Did they or did they not perform as expected? Did they out perform your expectations?What were some pleasant and not so pleasant surprises?

I am planning on the following:

• Solar Hot Water
• Solar Electricity
  
• Passive Solar Heating
• Radiant Floor Heating
• Rocket Stove Mass Heater
• Graywater system
• Compost / Sawdust toilet (possibly though wife is pushing for flushing toilets :()

Thank you much guys in advance for all your feedback. Any and all is helpful. Please feel free to mention any green / sustainable products that worked or didn't work for you in addition to the ones listed above.

neoborn-

I have solar hot water, solar PV electric, and limited passive solar. I have detailed results for the solar PV electric on my website at www.ResidentialEnergyLaboratory.com. Performance to date is in excess of predictions by PVWatts.

Unfortunately, the solar hot water is not well enough instrumented to monitor its performance, except that my gas bills that are shown on the website are only a $1.00 or so above the connection fee during the summer, so that is an indication of good performance, at least during the summer.

I have details on the windows for passive solar heating, or tempering as some people like to correct me, but again not well documented other than modeling that indicates about 35% or so of the space heating is from passive solar. I will be adding details on the modeling results, but not there yet. Heating bills are modest due to good insulation and passive solar, and are included on the website.