heating a house with solar energy

Kevin_in_Denver_2

Of course, a Steffes unit is only worthwhile if your electric utility offers a favorable off-peak rate. For example, in Colorado, Xcel doesn't offer any discount.

johnnyge

heating a house with solar energy

I am interesting on buying a house but the problem is that the heating is a hot water baseboard oil boiler. Because of the price of oil I will like to know if there is other form to run the hot water baseboards with other type of boiler that will run from solar panels. there is not gas service in the area where the house is located only electric service. So if I change to electric heating the price will be very high, thats why i will like to know if there is a system that can be run from solar panel and more or less how expensive will be to get it change.I know that in this site noone discuss prices.What I am asking is a ball park figure of this type of changes so i can make an offer on the house according the convertion.Thank you

WV EGBERT_2

solar

Well, solar won't help much with HWBB emitters. They usually run at high temps. That is of course if the baseboard was way oversized, then possible to run at lower temp. Solar is somewhat ideal for lower temp systems like radiant.
If you want to install solar thermal for domestic hot water production then your money will be better applied in that application.
How is your domestic hot water heated now?
Also with current system look into adding outdoor resest control to boiler. And look at house as a system, will newer windows , insulation, blower door test, be better investment to contol fuel usage.

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Mike Dunn

You should look into

the Steffes Hydronic Comfort Plus system. It is an electric thermal storage unit that stores energy in ceramic bricks heated by off-peak electric rates. The brick chamber can reach up to 1100-1200 degrees. This stored energy is used when your off-peak is off.

Here is a link:

http://www.steffes.com/offpeak/comfortplus/hyd_overview.aspx

hot_rod

Define the load first

spend time and money to lower the heating load as much as possible. insulation upgrades, weather strips, possible window upgrades, blower door test, etc.

With the target as close as possible now you can design a solar thermal component.

Old time solar installers seem to agree 30% solar heat is affordable and realistic.

Of course if budget allows and you want to prove a point 90% or more is do-able.

I have seen small homes in the mountains of Europe with 90% solar DHW and heat systems. I suspect the solar component was a large percentage of the homes cost 5- 15,000 thousand gallons of insulated storage, and a place to put it gets to be an engineering challenge.

These projects are sometimes refered to as solar systems with a housing annex. This project designed by Jenni Engineering.

hot rod

michael_34

solar in Michigan

for radiant base board heat besides needing higher temps, you will need lots of solar storage (water tanks) to draw off. Depending on the square footage and the heat load.
If you want to go PV (solar electric) you may need a 10k system (which is expensive) or more just to cover the electric load of the heating system (depending on what type you use).
I agree with Hot Rod. Lower your heat load first the best you can.

johnnyge

Thank you all for your advise. this is a excellent place to get ideas and to help help in heating and cooling issues. I will take in consideration insulation and prevention of heat lost,until an afforable solution for heating.