Why boilers are still a great heating source My article for PM Magazine

HydroNiCK

Hot_water_fan said:

Universities have the benefit of lots of DHW, laundry, district heating and pool heating needs. Plus often a maintenance staff. You need a big house to match that load profile! 

I'm not recommending you get a cogen boiler plant that supplies the University of Nebraska and try to stick in your basement.  The flow boiler I posted is prob a better fit. 
The debate boils (no pun intended) down to nat gas vs electric.  Then the hair splitting starts.  While Arguing over 2cents a kw and mapping out ng pipelines people lose site of what's available.  CHP  marry's the two and blows the argument out of the water.  Heat pumps are great for cooling they were less so for heating by themselves. People are being sold heat pumps as the answer to clean heat and forget that they cool.  Cooling is a big part of the equation.  CHP makes a boiler an efficient way to heat.

Rich_49

hot_rod said:

Rich_49 said:

hot_rod said:

Rich_49 said:

hot_rod said:

CoGens are thermally led. In other words if you don't have a constant thermal load, they don't pencil out well. We had the Lochinvar folks on a Coffee with Caleffi talking about the pros and cons for CoGen.

They work great on a university campus until everyone goes home for the summer and the DHW and heat load are gone. It becomes expensive electricity. And you need a place to dump all the thermal output.

A fan and radiator comes to mind

Sounds like a good way to sell Thermal storage tanks . Hey , that's what your company does right ? The discussion so far has been mostly about homes Bob , not universities

Actually the post started out about boilers, but many posts here go off on tangents.

Caleffi hasn’t sold thermal storage tanks for about 10 years now, if that is what you are referring to?

But we still understand and train the industry on how to size, pipe and apply thermal storage tanks.

That's funny , I've purchased them as little as a year ago .
https://www.caleffi.com/usa/en-us/catalogue/thermocontm-storage-tanks-nas20025

You’re right I see them in the 2019 catalog, not sure if they were in 2020?
.

Just to be clear . I just pulled this out of the 2022 catalog . https://www.caleffi.com/sites/default/files/file/01179-20_na.pdf

Hot_water_fan

@HydroNiCK I guess? I think I see your point. A combined cycle is a great piece of equipment, trying to beat it at .002% of the size is interesting but pretty damn difficult unless you have a lot of thermal needs. Even then, it’s better if the ratio of thermal to electricity produced is skewed more towards electricity 

hot_rod

Rich_49 said:

hot_rod said:

Rich_49 said:

hot_rod said:

Rich_49 said:

hot_rod said:

CoGens are thermally led. In other words if you don't have a constant thermal load, they don't pencil out well. We had the Lochinvar folks on a Coffee with Caleffi talking about the pros and cons for CoGen.

They work great on a university campus until everyone goes home for the summer and the DHW and heat load are gone. It becomes expensive electricity. And you need a place to dump all the thermal output.

A fan and radiator comes to mind

Sounds like a good way to sell Thermal storage tanks . Hey , that's what your company does right ? The discussion so far has been mostly about homes Bob , not universities

Actually the post started out about boilers, but many posts here go off on tangents.

Caleffi hasn’t sold thermal storage tanks for about 10 years now, if that is what you are referring to?

But we still understand and train the industry on how to size, pipe and apply thermal storage tanks.

That's funny , I've purchased them as little as a year ago .
https://www.caleffi.com/usa/en-us/catalogue/thermocontm-storage-tanks-nas20025

You’re right I see them in the 2019 catalog, not sure if they were in 2020?
.

Just to be clear . I just pulled this out of the 2022 catalog . https://www.caleffi.com/sites/default/files/file/01179-20_na.pdf

It good that you can still find them out there. The were a great tank, still nothing like it out there. Tough to ship, one at a time, even in a sturdy wooden crate they often got damaged in freight.

Waher

hot_rod said:

CoGens are thermally led. In other words if you don't have a . And you need a place to dump all the thermal output

In the summer time dump the waste heat into an absorptive chiller to make coolth and hot water storage tanks to reduce the amount of reheat necessary for various hot hydronic systems.

Solar hot water and preheat makes much more sense efficiency wise than photovoltaics most of the time. Really irks me how much money and effort is wasted chasing carbon over nonsense rather than going after low hanging fruit of energy capture/recapture.

Hot_water_fan

Solar hot water and preheat makes much more sense efficiency wise than photovoltaics most of the time. Really irks me how much money and effort is wasted chasing carbon over nonsense rather than going after low hanging fruit of energy capture/recapture.

The problem is that the efficiency isn’t the issue! It’s the cost of solar thermal - double or triple the efficiency of PV if the stars align but much more expensive. Money isn’t wasted on PV - it’s cheaper and electricity is inherently more valuable. Overpaying for some btus isn’t low hanging at all!

Waher

Hot_water_fan said:

Solar hot water and preheat makes much more sense efficiency wise than photovoltaics most of the time. Really irks me how much money and effort is wasted chasing carbon over nonsense rather than going after low hanging fruit of energy capture/recapture.

The problem is that the efficiency isn’t the issue! It’s the cost of solar thermal - double or triple the efficiency of PV if the stars align but much more expensive. Money isn’t wasted on PV - it’s cheaper and electricity is inherently more valuable. Overpaying for some btus isn’t low hanging at all!

Figure in the lifespan of the equipment, batteries, panels....

Hot_water_fan

PV standard is 25 year warranty, the microinverters have the same. Batteries don't but if so inclined, you can use the same thermal storage that solar thermal would.

It's hard to see a path for thermal today when it's been several decades without any traction in the US, meanwhile PV is skyrocketing. Thermal can't just be as good or slightly better - it needs to being substantially better to win contractors, utilities and buyers over.