Last edited by a moderator:
HWHP consider
- Thread starter EbS-P
- Start date
-
Active since 1995, Hearth.com is THE place on the internet for free information and advice about wood stoves, pellet stoves and other energy saving equipment.
We strive to provide opinions, articles, discussions and history related to Hearth Products and in a more general sense, energy issues.
We promote the EFFICIENT, RESPONSIBLE, CLEAN and SAFE use of all fuels, whether renewable or fossil.
I have been considering one for a while now. Concerns I have, maybe you can comment?
- I would need to install a condensate pump as the unit would be in the basement below my septic outlet. Can be done but just another thing that will break.....
- It will make my basement colder in the winter. As it is now my basement gets down to 45-50 F in the winter which will reduce the effectiveness of the heat pump. I also like to work down there so I may need some temporary heating..... (fire up the oil burner....lol)
Yes if you don’t have a drain you need a pump. We have a macerating toilet pump.
Yes it will make you basement cooler. The amount depends on how much hot water you use. We heat our basement as its living space. The room where the water heater is has a mechanical space. It’s a small bedroom but the kids keep the door open. I have it ducted to intake near the ceiling and exhaust blowing down to the floor. In hybrid mode it will kick on the electric elements. This never happens in the summer as the intel temps are high. It happens in the winter quite a bit. It’s an 80 gallon unit and we are a family of 7.
Basement has 17’ glass garage door. It can easily hit 55 if we don’t heat it.
We had resistive electric before. Cost is about 30% less. Now we have solar.
If I had oil and my tank was over 15 years old I would be ditching oil completely and removing the tank. If it’s newer I’d probably keep it as backup.
It is easily the fastest ROI for any energy efficiency improvement you can make. I don’t know that the tax credit situation is now.
Yes it will make you basement cooler. The amount depends on how much hot water you use. We heat our basement as its living space. The room where the water heater is has a mechanical space. It’s a small bedroom but the kids keep the door open. I have it ducted to intake near the ceiling and exhaust blowing down to the floor. In hybrid mode it will kick on the electric elements. This never happens in the summer as the intel temps are high. It happens in the winter quite a bit. It’s an 80 gallon unit and we are a family of 7.
Basement has 17’ glass garage door. It can easily hit 55 if we don’t heat it.
We had resistive electric before. Cost is about 30% less. Now we have solar.
If I had oil and my tank was over 15 years old I would be ditching oil completely and removing the tank. If it’s newer I’d probably keep it as backup.
It is easily the fastest ROI for any energy efficiency improvement you can make. I don’t know that the tax credit situation is now.
Family of 7.... God bless. We had 2 and that was enough.
Thanks for the info, very useful. I have been wondering if I go solar and the system is sized to provide 100% is it just easier to go with electric resistive.... Cheaper initial cost, easier to install, warms the basement..
Well… I haven’t done the math to see if more solar is cheaper than HPWH. It probably all depends on how your net metering works. We work on a monthly basis. I get paid for excess sent to the grid each billing cycle. At a 10kw array making about 12Mwh a year with an EV driving a lot I use more than I produce a year. 10kw was as big as I could get permitted by utility for.
So the question is how soon do you do solar? With the federal tax credits ending soon my guess is you’re looking at 3 years out of every. So what’s the ROI on based on oil and electricity prices. I think I was about 4 years to break even.
12 Mwhr / year is a pretty good sized system. We do not use nearly that much, but we also use gasoline / oil and only 3 of us right now. Not sure what the net metering rules are in CT. I know in some states they only pay the wholesale generation rate for net outflows, which is a lot lower than the residential rate we pay. I got to run the numbers and see. My timing is not good as the fed credits are about to expire, I am sure all the contractors are overloaded with orders right now. Will be curious to see how the market changes next year, I am sure some will cease to exist. Would not be surprised to see pricing come down as they all compete at market rates, but we shall see....
I need to do a new roof in the next couple years anyway..... so I can wait and see what happens.
Labor rates probably won’t budge (recession not withstanding) . Panel prices with the tariffs won’t go down. Datacenter electric consumption I think was misjudged years ago and just now has producers scrambling to get projects planned only to find it’s a 5 year wait for NG turbines. All the renewables just got put on hold. Hopefully your utility commission can act is responsible way.
sloeffle
Minister of Fire
You can't say this loud enough. When there were three of us living here, my electric bill went down by $40+ a month.
There are other secondary benefits of a HPWH to consider also:
- Dehumidification of the surrounding area
- A decreased peak electrical load when you're on backup power, whether a generator or solar/wind.
- Air filtration in the area where it operates
- It can harvest waste heat from dryers, fridges, electronics, etc through strategic placement or ducting. Our harvests heat from our HP dryer and solar inverter.
- If you have hard water, the tank is less likely to fill with minerals. Our 10-year-old HPWH has not accumulated any minerals thus far. This is due to how the heating coils surround the tank rather than being immersed in water as resistance heating elements are. Our 2nd electrical resistance water heater has to be drained and cleaned every few years.
My HPWH (80 gallon EO Smith Voltrex) is entering year 13 of service. Supported two teen girls with long showers.
Cost me a bundle to install... in a HCOL area in 2012. Blown control board in year 3 after power surge, maker fedexed me a new board and I popped it in myself. Otherwise, ZERO maintenance in 13 years.
I figure it has paid for itself 3X over.
In a tuck under garage that gets to 40-45°F in cold winter. It switches to coil heat below 45°F IIRC, maybe a couple weeks per year.
I spend a lot to keep the garage dehumidified (close to my bill for central ac in the house), I figure the HPWH displaces that.
Cost me a bundle to install... in a HCOL area in 2012. Blown control board in year 3 after power surge, maker fedexed me a new board and I popped it in myself. Otherwise, ZERO maintenance in 13 years.
I figure it has paid for itself 3X over.
In a tuck under garage that gets to 40-45°F in cold winter. It switches to coil heat below 45°F IIRC, maybe a couple weeks per year.
I spend a lot to keep the garage dehumidified (close to my bill for central ac in the house), I figure the HPWH displaces that.
Last edited:
sloeffle
Minister of Fire
I've been looking at how to do this on my second new one (manufacturer replaced the first one under warranty). Mine is three or four years old at this point. I'll probably need every ratchet extension that I have and maybe a few more. Kick myself in the butt for not pulling it when I first bought it and putting some never seize on the threads of the anode rod.
I do think if 80% of the heating is done by heatpump then the anode must last longer. I just don’t know how much.
IIRC, "cathodic protection", the same way that underground metal tanks and other structures are protected.
I tried to remove the sacrificial anode on my 30-year-old, 40-gallon e-resistance tank once and had a problem keeping the tank from moving as I used a long cheater bar on it. If you can keep the tank still, then a torque multiplier like the one below may help. Maybe you can borrow one from a heavy equipment mechanic or elsewhere?
sloeffle
Minister of Fire
Never thought about the torque multiplier idea, I like that. Thought about using an impact but I'm not sure if that's a good idea since the tank walls are so thin and you might end up just twisting the rod out (goes back to my previous comment about putting never seize on the threads). Did you have problems with the tank moving when there was water in it, or was it empty?
I don't recall. I may have drained it for other services like cleaning all the minerals out.
I guess that would be my first suggestion to someone trying to remove the anode, do it with the tank full. 330 lb of water should help to steady it.
I would have used my 3/4" drive Ingersoll Rand impact on it, but the water heater was on the 2nd floor and my not-really-portable compressor resides 2 floors down.
I'm not sure, but I believe that the layer of (hardness} minerals that forms in the WH may be protective of both the anode and tank. Neither has required replacement in over 35 years. Of course, those minerals are also a pain to remove periodically. Simply draining the tank does not do this.
my LP powered water heater is 33 years old. never get that out of anything made now days, My 33 year old roof looks in better shape than most anything 10 years old. course if i want to change ins co. i will have to put a new one on, as the ins co won't even quote because of its age.
Similar threads
