To Geothermal From Propane

crackerjack222 · Jan 15, 2012

I am not sure a "tractor forum" is the proper place for this, but here it is anyway: I have a 17 year old geothermal system in my 3000 sq ft house. I installed this system myself using parts bought from a supplier that has since closed up. I have been happy with it, but could probably get better efficiency with a new system. My house is 40 ft from a 400 acre constant level lake so I pump water out of the lake, thru the heat exchangers (two compressors) and back to the lake. I have a six zone system with six thermostats, six fans in the plenum and six duct runs. There are two return air registers (upstairs and downstairs).
I want to replace the six zone control system with a more modern one, as well as the compressors and air handler. Does anyone have any experience or recommendations for a control system that will handle six zones?

JamesHW · Jan 15, 2012

crackerjack222 said:
I am not sure a "tractor forum" is the proper place for this, but here it is anyway: I have a 17 year old geothermal system in my 3000 sq ft house. I installed this system myself using parts bought from a supplier that has since closed up. I have been happy with it, but could probably get better efficiency with a new system. My house is 40 ft from a 400 acre constant level lake so I pump water out of the lake, thru the heat exchangers (two compressors) and back to the lake. I have a six zone system with six thermostats, six fans in the plenum and six duct runs. There are two return air registers (upstairs and downstairs).
I want to replace the six zone control system with a more modern one, as well as the compressors and air handler. Does anyone have any experience or recommendations for a control system that will handle six zones?

I'm still just evaluating GT for my needs, so can't provide any answers, but have found that the forum over at Green Building Talk to be very helpful.

MWRR · Jan 15, 2012

We have had GEO since we moved in to our 3286 sq ft home built in 1995 (built it myself). It has a WATER FURNACE 3ton unit with a 4ton horizontal loop. The unit has electrical backup heating elements, but they have never kicked on. We live in Illinois and it has gotten down to below 0 F. We too have the hot water aux heat which basically preheats the water going into our hotwater heater (a by product of the system when it is running). Our GEO is on a separate meter from the electric for the rest of the house. The wife checked a couple of months ago and the heat AND air conditioning for our home for the previous twelve month period was $360. We never open our windows.....if it's cold the heat runs; if it's hot the air runs.
Today it was 26 F and our air conditioning was running from about 11am till near sun down thanks to the large windows we have on the south side of the house. I have often wondered how much we would save if we didn't let the air condition run during the winter.

TheGoose · Jan 15, 2012

I sure wish we had more info RE: these Geo systems during the summer months.

Heat here is no problem, but during the summer months we really use some A/C. For some reason GEO has not caught on here for cooling.

My family had a GEO powered A/C in the early 80's but it was not as efficient as we had hoped b/c it was not installed correctly. It used an open source well and discharged into a pond.

wngsprd · Jan 16, 2012

Island Farmer said:
Hello wngsprd,

What company manufactured your new unit? I have been thinking about changing over to geothermal for a long time. When I do it, I'd really like to get it right the first time.

Island Farmer

It was a close call between the Water Furnace and the ClimateMaster Tranquility. We went with the Tranquility 27 due to our belief we would have better support in our area. It has run well and quietly, and matched up with our existing zone control board, hot water heater, and needed only minor modifications to connect into the ductwork.

heehaw · Jan 16, 2012

the main point i was trying to make, was how much more eff the new systems are than they were 15-20 years ago: going from a 20 year old geo system to a regular heat pump, and the bills dropped: IF he had gone with a new geo system, i am sure the bills would
have dropped even more..installation and maintenance are the biggest problems with
a geo system: people will say they know all about them, and they don't...
heehaw

Island Farmer · Jan 16, 2012

wngsprd said:
It was a close call between the Water Furnace and the ClimateMaster Tranquility. We went with the Tranquility 27 due to our belief we would have better support in our area. It has run well and quietly, and matched up with our existing zone control board, hot water heater, and needed only minor modifications to connect into the ductwork.

Thanks for the additional information.

fishpick · Jan 16, 2012

Our unit is a GeoComfort... Nice unit... My advice here is buy for the dealer and service, most units are pretty comparable nowadays. Dealers - they vary widely!

fishpick · Jan 24, 2012

I started this thread to give some real numbers about installing a geothermal system this fall to try and offset the rising propane costs. To give you some hard numbers behind the reasoning and the results I wanted to post an update. So far we have used only 90 gallons of propane since it was installed in October (hot water, stove, fireplace, grill) - and that includes the volume shrinking in the tank when things get cold. That 90 gallons cost us $270...

Until now we have not gotten an electric bill for the geothermal system... that's because November's bill, although it was a meter read actual bill it was unusually warm so it really was a poor estimator of cost. December's bill, while the weather was still warmer than normal, was an estimated bill based off last years readings / usage. So - we expected a real punch in the gut for January since it would, in essence, be "correcting" us for 2 months of above baseline electric usage for the geothermal... and although this winter has been "warmer" than usual - there have been several cold windy periods.

Well - the bill just came... but let me give you a frame of reference since the January bill also includes all those Christmas lights AND my wife being home from school so the TV is on more, etc. Also - keep in mind, with geothermal I have not been setting the house back during the day (or at night) because I work from home and last year with propane, set it back to save money and froze during the day.

Last year the January bill was - $117.62
Two years ago it was - $138.89

Now - keep in mind those previous years we were paying an additional $250 per month for propane.

Our most recent, keeping the house 70 degrees all the time, generating free hot water geothermal electric bill - $223.18

Let me put this another way... for months of December and January - we kept our house at 70 degrees 24 hours a day - for only $50 per month. And we won't need another propane fill for 12 months - and then it will be no more than $300.

Gotta love heating with dirt!