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I'd go to glycol …. but don't keep the water make-up, change it to a small glycol make-up reservoir. These small units are available with pump included to address this problem.

Others have noted you can run your heat pump when the weather gets cold, but you probably SHOULD run your fossil fuel heating system system when it is cold. Your installer should have calculated the temperature below which the boiler is more cost efficient and set it up with your "hopefully" advanced thermostats. They will use your local fuel costs to calculate that. If you use natural gas its going to be pretty high (40+). If its oil or propane it might be quite a bit lower. Find out how that is (or should be) set up before deciding on glycol.

The heat pump was also designed and sized either to take on the whole load (less common) or only a partial load while depending on the boiler for the coldest temps. You need to know what the design was.

Once you know these things you can make a decision on running the boiler circ full time under certain outdoor temps, or using glycol, or draining it.

You will enjoy having two systems to count on.

My thought is you should only be using the heat pumps Spring , Summer, and fall. Then lower the set point so they stay off use as a backup if temperatures drop below 50 so it comes on during any emergency.

Use your main heating system during the winter months with possible freezing temperatures.

Enjoy!

Here’s an update:

My daughter and other aviators are continuing to make flights into the affected areas even as I write this.

Myself and some men from our church took down two trailer loads yesterday. The need is far greater than what you may be seeing on TV or the internet. We met a young lady at the church where we delivered the supplies who had lost 20 of her immediate relatives. Tragic.

Regarding the inoperative links that are posted above: my daughter said that donorbox shut it down because they were getting too many donations and they suspected fraud! Can you imagine that? Blueridge Aviation is a legitimate organization and there pictures and videos of what they’re doing all over FB. Our local sheriff and his deputies have been collecting goods and bringing them thereto be flown in by them! But donorbox suspects fraud?

My daughter said they are gonna try and get another means of donating online setup asap.

Thank you for all who are praying, caring and trying to help! It’s making a difference.

Our church is also taking donations if you’d like to help that way.

You can send a cheque to:

Faith Baptist Church

620 Essex Drive

Staunton, VA 24401

Mark it for “Relief Fund”. I can assure you that every penny will go towards that.

Thanks again.

I did a lot of pipe thawing back when we had the shop in the mountains
Infiltration was the biggest cause of freeze up. Windy days at below freezing conditions, we were always frozen pipe days. That’s when I got sold on spray foam, even a 1/2” layer with batts over it would seal a building against infiltration.

Underground piping froze when we had years with little snowfall to insulate the yards

The seal around the bottom of the wall and the plate and the floor is usually poor. pipes usually freeze not when it is the coldest but when it is fairly cold and there is a wind to push air in through openings in the building that are close to a pipe.

How much work are you doing and how much piping is in the exterior wall? Perhaps moving it will solve numerous problems. Glycol needs maintenance of the inhibitor. Placing the insulation between the exterior and the piping would seem to be an amount of work where re-routing the piping would be a negligible additional step.

hot water does NOT freeze quicker!

I would think that if the wall bay insulation is placed between the outside wall surface and the piping, then the piping would remain at or near the indoor ambient temperature, so it would not be much more vulnerable to freezing than any other interior piping.