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[ChoochCharlie]

Who has GT right now?
What would you do different in the future?
What do you love about it?

[disleksic]

The girl that works in the office with me her hubby installs them and they say that its a big investment but saves you money in the long run she has told me alittle about them and they sound very interesting and I wish I could afford to put one in

[ryanmercer]

The girl that works in the office with me her hubby installs them and they say that its a big investment but saves you money in the long run she has told me alittle about them and they sound very interesting and I wish I could afford to put one in

They are also very old :) The Romans were using geothermal heating setups to keep homes warm in the colder months :)

[ChoochCharlie]

They are also very old :) The Romans were using geothermal heating setups to keep homes warm in the colder months :)

True. But in the US, we are talking about active geo-thermal, not passive.
We generally use ground source heat pumps.

[JAK]

How much does the drilling part typically cost?

[disleksic]

she says here it costs about for 200 feet down it cost $2500 for one hole and if you have a 4 ton unit you would need 4 holes

[Catalpa]

Wow, that's expensive! I'd like to kick the propane habit, but it looks like the alternatives are too expensive.

Is there a good resource for info on these systems?

[AlchemyAcres]

Wow, that's expensive! *I'd like to kick the propane habit, but it looks like the alternatives are too expensive.

Is there a good resource for info on these systems?


I gave up propane of any type over 11 years ago...I refuse to play the game.

Have you considered alternatives to expensive geothermal? I plan to build a PAHS home in the summer of 2008 or 2009.

http://www.axwoodfarm.com/PAHS/UmbrellaHouse.html

~Martin :)

[JakeLeg]

There was a news item recently about a school district nearby that was awarded millions of dollars in a lawsuit against the engineers because the geothermal system that was installed in their new highschool several years back is NOT costing less.

the jury is still out for me. i'd have to see a long term cost-benefit analysis for it to be convinced that it is the way to go.

what's the payoff rate? 5 years? 10 years? 20?

[ryanmercer]

I gave up propane of any type over 11 years ago...I refuse to play the game.

Have you considered alternatives to expensive geothermal? I plan to build a PAHS home in the summer of 2008 or 2009.

http://www.axwoodfarm.com/PAHS/UmbrellaHouse.html

~Martin :)





Awesome link man :)

[docjered]

I installed geothermal 15 years ago. It is Water Furnace brand. The cost was 11 thousand dollars, fifteen years ago. I financed it 100% on my electric bill with a ten year amortization. I actually saved over $100 a month over my old system, so it actually had a payoff of about six years. I am still enjoying the benefits, even though our power company recently raised rates substantially. As to maintenance costs, $350 for a new circuit board three years ago is my only expense to date.

[MinotBob]

I have a HydronModule system installed in my place in North Dakota. Although I don't yet live there full time, my brother-in-law has for the past two years.

The previous owner had it installed when they rebuilt the house and had a separate power meter installed just for the GT system. So we know exactly how much it costs to run. In the winter it costs us about $40/ month and last summer in August when the A/C was running the cost was <$10.00. It also supplements the the Hot water system.

A pretty cost effective system but expensive to install.

[joshua46v10]

a good book is The passive solar house : the complete guide to heating and cooling your home its writen by James Kachadorian. i would pick it up from a library first.

[Al_Coda]

Considered it before construction of our off-grid passive solar house, but the cost and power requirements were too high for my liking. While it's less automatic and more labor intensive, we decided a wood stove was the way for us. 'Course, we're surrounded by free fuel in the national forest too... The bldg code wouldn't allow that as the sole heat for the house, so we went with a medium efficiency baseboard hot water boiler (propane). It hasn't been turned on since the plumbing/heat inspector left, and we had one of the coldest Februarys in years. ;D

One book we found indispensible in the design phase (and now living in the proof that the principles discussed there work) was "The Solar House: Passive Heating and Cooling" by Daniel Chiras.

One book not to waste your time/money on is "Solar House: A Guide for the Solar Designer" by Terry Galloway - it was useless, except perhaps if you live in southern California and have a team of engineers from Honeywell making sure everything works.

I'd still love to find a way to incorporate geothermal, particularly for cooling - just can't get past the cost. When I tried to come up with a lower cost, DIY solution to possibly incorporate it into the hydronic heating system as a means of comfort cooling in the summer, I couldn't find a way around the problem of condensation (and mold). For the same reasons, the earth tube idea got pitched too.

It's a shame that there isn't a more efficient way to get the heat (and cold) out of the earth.