Reality of solar heat?

[bcroe]

Hey Everyone, As Winter sets in my frustration follows...

I live in S.E. Washington State in a 2200sf house that was built in the late 40's to early 50's. It has been
remodeled with double pane windows and 1" of EPS foam board wrapped the exterior walls. It also sports
a 1.5 ton Goodman heat pump.

My frustration comes from trying to maintain 67F in the downstairs of the house. We keep the upstairs
bedrooms closed off & unheated. Even with that the heat pump is running 24/7 with the dreaded "aux heat"
showing on the thermostat. It is telling me to start expecting the $300-$400 electric bills..

I considered adding wood heat.

I was contemplating that the other day and wondering how practical a solar collector on the roof heating
water (&.antifreeze) to feed hydronic heaters in the living room.

I have been looking and reading about solar heat and I am finding that it has fallen out of favor. Is it simple
impractical or am I hearing sour grapes from folks that had a bad experience with the sketchy solar outfits
that proliferated back in the 80's and 90's?

We average 176 sunny days a year. Typical sunny Winter days will have high temps ranging from 10F to 40F..

Is there a practical solar solution? Evacuated tube? Flat plate collectors?
Suggestions? Thanks!

Thermal collectors have difficulty in cold climates, because you get the least heat when you
need it most, and they do poorly or freeze up in frigid weather. Wood burning works, but
requires a constant input of time and labor to function.

I am using PV solar with net metering to solve all these problems. I have no problem keeping
the house at 75 F using mini split air to air heat pumps, for outside weather down to zero F.
When 20 below zero F and colder happen, I may need to use more of my net metering energy
reserve for some resistance heating. The propane furnace only stands by for a power outage
backup. The insulation of 5000 sq ft here is pretty poor, another project.

Your 1.5 ton heat pump is far too small for serious heating, and older designs have rather poor
efficiency. 6 tons in use here. Bruce Roe

[JSchnee21]

I assume you don't have natural gas? Is your entire house electric? Perhaps it's the region of the country, but I'm surprised a home of that vintage wouldn't have either oil, natural gas, or propane heat. Has it always been heated by heat pump? Is it a newer unit / well maintained? Or did they remove the oil tank when they flipped it?

Weather sealing and insulation are certainly the least expensive solution with the best ROI (generally). Have you had a home energy audit? A quality company that specializes in these will quickly help you find leaks, drafts, etc. Is the entire house one zone? (mine is, which sux, but I have gas fired forced hot air (which is cheap to operate) and we predominately live on the second floor -- split level.

Did you have the upgrades done, or was it flipped before you bought it? You'd be surprised what a poor job of sealing/insulating around replacement windows is commonly done. Similarly, if your 2nd floor overhangs the first by a foot or so (never understood why the do this) these ares are often poorly or not insulated at all.

PV could be a solution to offset your electric consumption, but you'd be looking at much more substantial investment -- north of $25K. Geothermal heat would be even more.

You could install supplemental baseboard heat on the first floor (electric or water). A recirculating water system would be the cheapest to operate (on natural gas, propane, or wood) but would have a much more substantial install cost. But electric baseboards are easy and cheap to install (if you can easily pull 240 feeds from a near by electrical panel).

While electric heat is generally "expensive" since you would only be heating the rooms you are in (and not trying to heat your whole house) this would likely be cheaper then running Supplemental (electric heat) on your heat pump.

A relatively new solution (in the USA) is a wood pellet boiler -- This would provide hot water for radiators and potentially replace your electric hot water heater.

https://www.maineenergysystems.com/wood-pellet-boiler/

https://www.pellergy.com/wood-pellet-boilers/

Alternatively, a high efficiency propane boiler with an inexpensive PVC Schedule 40 vent

[Ampster]

A friend in Hermosa Beach is very happy with his hydronic system using PV solar panels and a heat pump water heater. It is a grid tie system and he banks energy with his utility in the summer and uses it to power the heat pump water heater in winter. His home is all electric.
Obviously he is in a more temperate climate than you so the economics will be different. Another friend in that same city used evacuated tube collectors to heat his hot tub in his all electric home.

[peakbagger]

Many have tried few have succeeded in your quest. The fundamental problem is you want maximum heat on the coldest days while the panels want to give you maximum heat on the warmest days. You end up having to oversize everything and then you need to figure out how to waste heat on the warmer days. The far better option is install PV panels and and a cold source mini split heat pump. Cold climate minisplits work down to -12 F but the COP drops so most use them down to about 20 F, They are far more efficient than a standard heat pump as they cut out the intermediate ductwork. You also get AC in the summer at higher efficiency as you cut out the ductwork. If you have net metering available you effectively can store power generated in the summer to generate heat in the winter. I have done that for 5 years in Northern NH in far colder climate and use the mini split for so called shoulder season heating. I use a wood boiler for the colder weather that I expect you don't have at your location. My backup is heating oil but I haven't bought any for five years and go through about 3 to 4 cords of wood.

My guess is you probably have poor insulation in the buried part of your lower floor and a standard concrete slab. They can really suck the heat out of lower level space. If the foundation walls and floor is not insulated consider spending the money on insulating the buried walls and put high density foam on the floor and a floating floor system on top.

[PNW_Steve]

Hey Everyone,

As Winter sets in my frustration follows...

I live in S.E. Washington State in a 2200sf house that was built in the late 40's to early 50's. It has been remodeled with double pane windows and 1" of EPS foam board wrapped the exterior walls. It also sports a 1.5 ton Goodman heat pump.

My frustration comes from trying to maintain 67F in the downstairs of the house. We keep the upstairs bedrooms closed off & unheated. Even with that the heat pump is running 24/7 with the dreaded "aux heat" showing on the thermostat. It is telling me to start expecting the $300-$400 electric bills..

I considered adding wood heat. I got an estimate from a local fireplace shop to install a wood or pellet stove on the first floor. The work required to place the chimney blew that project out of the water. Nearly $8000...... And I would have the chimney take a chunk out of my bedroom.

Many years ago I built a solar pool heater for a family member. We had no idea what we were doing. We were just "winging it ". We built what amounted to a "ladder" out of 3/4" PVC pipe and fittings and diverted a portion of the flow exiting the filter through the collector and back into the pool. We painted the collector flat black.

i would like to say that it worked perfectly but it didn't . About a month later I had to go back and modify it. The pool was too warm. We bypassed almost half of the collector made it just right.

I was contemplating that the other day and wondering how practical a solar collector on the roof heating water (&.antifreeze) to feed hydronic heaters in the living room. That is where we spend most of our time.

I have been looking and reading about solar heat and I am finding that it has fallen out of favor. Is it simple impractical or am I hearing sour grapes from folks that had a bad experience with the sketchy solar outfits that proliferated back in the 80's and 90's?

We average 176 sunny days a year. Typical sunny Winter days will have high temps ranging from 10F to 40F..

Is there a practical solar solution?

Evacuated tube? Flat plate collectors?

Suggestions?

Thanks!