Silly Question
is there any boiler work in the southern states, I know it sounds silly but does anyone do commercial Boiler work or maybe even residential boiler work?I’m from New England I’ve only known boiler work in the northeast.
Comments
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Supply and Demand. Lots of heat pumps in the south. Not so many boilers. But I'm in Charleston South Carolina and wish I had a boiler heating system right now.
Edward Young Retired
After you make that expensive repair and you still have the same problem, What will you check next?
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Where in the South are you looking?
Bob Boan
You can choose to do what you want, but you cannot choose the consequences.0 -
Texas, Carolinas, Georgia, I’m assuming it’s mostly production boilers and most other heating is heat pumps and furnaces
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There are pockets of hydronics around. I did a training event at a wholesaler in Ashville, NC years ago. They had a market for hydronics and steam in that area.
The big money folks that built mansions there years ago, took hydronics and steam with them from their New England primary home experience. I met a plumber / hydronics guy from Long Island. A Holohan disciple that moved to NC and developed a niche for hydronic/ steam service and repair.
An estimated 6 million hydronic system in the US, I don't know if that includes steam. It would be interesting to see a cluster map developed to find these pockets.
Lots of commercial hydronics in Texas. Some of the larges separator we sell, 12 & 14" go to that market. Chilled systems and some process hydronics.
Bob "hot rod" Rohr
trainer for Caleffi NA
Living the hydronic dream0 -
Hospitals, Universities, PowerPoint, manufacturing & food production. Mad Dog
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There are several commercial boiler service companies in NC. WC Rouse, Icon Boiler, Lewis Boiler, C&C Boiler. All in Greensboro and all good.
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Is DC part of the south? Older houses often have boilers. Pre WW2. Newer construction will have air conditioning and it's hard to justify a boiler if you're running ductwork.
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DC is below the Mason Dixon line so, yeah, it is part of the south but southerners don't claim it.
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Steam is not just overwhelmingly northern, it is overwhelmingly northeast. It exists outside the northeast - you can find posts here from New Meixco and California, but most are from NYC/New England and few more down I-95 to DC.
When you get to the Midwest, steam systems are unicorns, only slightly more common than in the south (and little more common in Chicagoland). You can find a bunch of posts on here from folks in the Midwest (which starts at Rochester, NY) who can’t find good mechanics. When I’ve called a new company and say steam boiler, about half the companies decline and the half that takes it on tend to be the big guys.
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Chicago (the city) is 80-90% steam, some hot water. 'Burbs are a different story. Good deal of hydronic in the older burbs, new construction is all scorched air.
My 1920s house was originally gravity hot air, long since swapped out for a blower.
Trying to squeeze the best out of a Weil-McLain JB-5 running a 1912 1 pipe system.0 -
Power Point? I have a heat pump here in Charleston SC and I can still use Power Point on this laptop. It is a great program for illustrating your presentation.
I sold boiler jobs to 2 churches in the same month using a Power Point presentation. I wanted to have all the board members present for the presentation. and was able to field all the questions at once. This skipped the 20 question game that a written proposal would have had if I had just mailed it to the church. It was great, I used the same presentation and just tweaked a few slides to customize it to job. The Baptists purchased one large boiler with a combination Gas/Oil burner. The Lutherans took the 2 smaller boiler option. Same presentation, two different outcomes.
Is that the Power Point you are talking about Matt?
LOL 🤣
Edward Young Retired
After you make that expensive repair and you still have the same problem, What will you check next?
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I was trying to say that Chicago is an island of steam, but for some reason steam never took off in the other Midwest/Great Lakes industrial cities (St Louis, Minneapolis, Milwaukee, Detroit, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Buffalo, Rochester, and Pittsburgh).
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True. Interesting that it didn't.
Trying to squeeze the best out of a Weil-McLain JB-5 running a 1912 1 pipe system.0 -
A lot of older cities had municipal steam, where it was distributed in pipes under the streets. Some still do.
In a Hollywood movie, if you want to convey a run-down urban center the trope you use is a manhole with steam coming out of it.
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I know that Boston, New York, Philadelphia and San Francisco at least still have steam as a public utility in their central business districts, and sometimes elsewhere.
In Boston and Philadelphia at least, most of the steam is a byproduct of electricity generation in modern gas turbine cogeneration plants with heat recovery steam generators that replaced the previous generation of steam-only plants.
A few years ago Veolia Energy built a new 18 inch steam main across the Charles River dam to carry cogenerated steam from Cambridge to loads in downtown Boston previously served by steam-only plants. This significantly increased overall thermal efficiency and reduced their carbon footprint. It also greatly reduced excessive temperatures in the Charles River basin caused by the plant's condensers, which were harming marine life.—
Bburd1 -
My city (Rochester) still has municipal steam in two places: Downtown and the former Kodak industrial park (which is actually going quite strong)..
But the steaam never left downtown here and I’m pretty sure that’s true everywhere but NYC. I’m less 1.5 miles from the steam plant and my street never had steam,
On the other hand my house has always had natural gas since it was built in 1920 - no coal box or oil tank remnants.
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Power PLANTS......Yes...all older cities and towns are loaded with Steam. Mad Dog
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This map details the geography of heating US homes based on fuel source. It was created from a US Census survey that was completed in 2021.
Forum Moderator
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A terrific map. Thanks for posting.
@HeatingHelp Have you seen a map that shows the types of "heating systems" in the fifty states? If so, will you post it here?
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Maybe not as much as Chicago, but detroit has a ton of steam. I once mentioned to a vendor that I was surprised they stocked steam boilers (no steam a few hours north) because a new steam boiler in my region is like a once a decade sale. They told me the overwhelming majority of their boiler sales were steam units sold to the detroit area. Pretty sure they have municipal steam available in the city from Detroit thermal as well.
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@Intplm., I wish! I haven't been able to track one down.
If anyone is interested in district heating systems, the International District Energy Association is a great resource. They post interesting news about systems in the US and around the world.
Here's a map of the district energy systems in North America:
Forum Moderator
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Theres a steam system in Detroit which is centrally operated and services most of the downtown area. The system is not tight and in the winter every manhole cover downtown has a large plume of vapor coming from it. Its awesomely eerie at night.
theres steam outside of the central downtown network but its hit or miss. Mixed bag of steam hot water and air ducts0 -
I spoke to a utility worker in NYC who was fixing one of the "steam chimneys" that you can see installed on the manholes where one of these apparent leaks is.
He told me that the issue is usually not a leak in the steam system, but rather it's a failure of the storm drain that is allowing storm water runoff or some other leaking water to come into contact with hot steam pipes (rather than an actual steam leak). I found that interesting so I'm sharing it!
NJ Steam Homeowner.
Free NJ and remote steam advice: https://heatinghelp.com/find-a-contractor/detail/new-jersey-steam-help/
See my sight glass boiler videos: https://bit.ly/3sZW1el
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Quite right about the steam chimneys. You have to remember that district steam is usually at a considerably higher pressure than the 2 or so psig we like to talk about — and thus at a considerably higher temperature. Storm water or rain or what have you hits the pipe and you get lovely vapour clouds!
Br. Jamie, osb
Building superintendent/caretaker, 7200 sq. ft. historic house museum with dependencies in New England0 -
if I recall correctly from my time living in Philadelphia, the supply pressure in the district steam system was 250 psig at about 450 degrees Fahrenheit.
—
Bburd0 -
NYC came in at 350PSI
Meeter room reducing station dropped it to 125.
primary to 60Secondary to 30 & 5psi
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