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The Hidden Costs of Hidden Pumps

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Comments
How does one do the math to determine when it makes economic sense to call the plumber or boiler guy to change out 5 or 6 pumps to something more efficient?
Also we see more and more VFD s. Can those compensate for incorrect pump selection?
Building superintendent/caretaker, 7200 sq. ft. historic house museum with dependencies in New England.
Hoffman Equipped System (all original except boiler), Weil-Mclain 580, 2.75 gph Carlin, Vapourstat 0.5 -- 6.0 ounces per square inch
But it is also about how much work they do with the amount of electricity they consume aka wire-water efficiency.
A standard type wet rotor circulator common in residential use is in the low 20% efficiency, when running in the best operating condition.
New ECM style circulators will do the same work with 50% or more electrical savings.
So add up the power consumption, estimate how many hours a year they run X electricity cost to get your answer. In a common heating climate maybe 3, 4- 5000 hours per year?
Degree day weather data, available online would be another way to estimate pump run time.
KillOWatt meters are an inexpensive way to get actual consumption.
trainer for Caleffi NA
The magic is in hydronics, and hydronics is in me
Small residential atmospheric steam boiler: 0.01watts /sq ft
Large multi-unit atmospheric steam boiler: 0.0017 watts/ sq ft
Large multi unit power burner ( 84 to 87 % thermal efficiency) steam boiler: 0.02 watts per sq ft
Small res atmospheric hot water: 0.039
Large multi-unit atmospheric: .045 watts/ sq ft
Large high efficiency boiler .05 watts/ sq ft ( figuring 2 pumps and an ECM fan plus some control power)
Still about 1/10 of forced air but the operation of pumps in the system has been ignored way too long.