School me on geothermal HVAC

Costs,ROI,etc,2200 sq ft home in the northeast.

 

All I can add is that my next door neighbor had it done in 2008...it was around $25K. How his ROI worked out I can't say; his company went bankrupt and he lost the house.

 

Well, that's a ringing endorsement.

 

EPA says they can save you $1500 per year (I didn't research their parameters). Payback would then be similar to photovoltaics without the tax credits. There may be incentives and tax breaks that shorten the payback.

 

When I did the math a few years ago, it only made sense if you were on propane from the tank in your yard. If on a connection to nat gas, not worth it.

 

Just purchased a house with the system already installed. As we get into the colder months I'm very curious as to what my energy bills will be. It's 100% electric.

 

Have a buddy in Michigan that has one . Don’t remember the initial cost exactly, but was around 3X the cost of a Natural Gas unit . A few year back the electronics fried out on Christmas Eve, no parts available for a few days . So no heat . When it was running it sounds like a waterfall inside that is transmitted to ductwork. If you want a white noise maker that sounds like that , have at it . No way would I ever get one .

 

My brother had one in Michigan (Oakland County) no complaints, said it saved him a bunch of money. Then they taxed it

 

On #2 now,(1st one was fine just smoke damage from fire and was 8 years old)
I stuck with *Water Furnace* brand and kept the old one in crawl as a back up.

#1 was a 4 ton unit (@2400 sq. ft house) with 2 pumps and 4 wells in the loop.
It worked awesome and loved it, electric bill was @ $100. Old house was pretty efficient.
It paid for itself quick due to tax credits and incentives available. @ 1 year.

They have made advances in designs, so in the replacement we could go with a smaller unit (3 ton) and a dual stage fan(this is key).
I was super leary about downsizing (still 2400sq ft.) but dude guaranteed it and it's been fine. We also scaled down to one pump with 3 ton. new unit has
UV light and we run it off an Ecobee that works with the system design/codes and alerts.
Electric bill is now @ $60. The new house is super efficient (All LED,ton's of foam,flat reflective roof, killer insulation and metal siding).
I designed the returns all up high due to tall cathedrals, and merged to a trunk in the middle of the house/attic, that trunk/collector
is built into a box of insulation to keep return air consistent. The new unit will run the fan only for 5 or 10 (u pick) minutes every hour to keep the air moving.

Only been in since July but happy we upgraded/downsized and happy we went Geo in the first place 9 years ago (Delaware)
One thing you MUST learn is you can't dance on the Tstat, Changes must be incremental.
1-2 degree or the units will sense a problem and go into stage 2 or 3 strip heat or kick ass A/C.
So keep your wife away from it!

 

Have it love it.
When conventional system took a shit we decided to go with geo because of few things.
1. There were incentives from bge, md state and federal government. Because of these incentives offset big chunk of initial cost (20k) we went for it.
2. They are supposed to last twice as long as conventional system granted workmanship can affect that in a big way.
3. Absolutely quiet you can barely hear it (above post about noise when running has to be some issue with the system, ducting…) also system has variable speed fan which helps with electricity usage and diffuse noise.
No unit outside, mine is in the attic.
3. Unit is “you set it and forget it” no messing around with thermometer, very low maintenance.
4. Saves you a lot of money in energy bills. My house is 2500 sf all electric, summer bill in humid Mid Atlantic Maryland is $180 and winter bill can vary as temperature in MD $240-280.
Keep in mind your house insulation will affect this number positively or negatively, also make sure that you will have enough room in your backyard for wells, number of which will also depend on size of your house. MAKE sure who ever installing it have good amount of experience with installation and setting the system up, leave your backyard the way they found it.
We have system in our house for 5 years now and no complaints.
Hope this helps, if you have questions ask and I will try to answer based on my experience with the system.

 

Damn, Bo. Your bills are higher than mine, with less square footage. Maybe my insulation is better (my windows sure as hell aren't) but our stove also runs off of propane, so maybe that's the difference. We have a Bosch heat pump with dual stage fan and the bill went down noticeably with that system.

 

Energy cost can vary widely according to geography. Electric & natural gas due to state regulations, fossil fuels due to zone pricing. Compare KWh, Therms, etc, instead of price to get a good comparison.
For example, my natural gas connection is $50/mo with no gas used. In the next region, it is less than $20/mo.

 

Dam, $600 a year just to have access to it? Wouldn't it be better to buy a big ass propane tank and bury it in the yard? That's what we did.

 

Had an ancient geothermal system that worked great, never had any problems, and the people we sold the house to tore it out (it was >25 years old) for a newer more efficient system. Crazy cheap to heat and cool, our 2200sqft house on even the old geothermal was less than our current, more modern 1300sqft house is on nat gas & regular a/c.

10/10 would run again. The old system had massive electric coils that used an insane amount of electricity if you asked it to heat >5 degrees above current. Not sure if they still do that.

 

My house is old and has limited insulation between the brick and plaster (walls are roughly R-10) on the outside walls. Propane would be more expensive than Nat Gas, but I'm still a bit miffed at the monthly base charges. I use Nat gas for heat, water heating, and clothes drying, so minimal use in summer, heavy in winter. I'm considering swapping A/C condenser for a heat pump in the near future.

 

It all depends on many factors, how many occupants, what is your summer and winter temperature setting, basement or no, etc, etc

 

I'm coming up on the 1 year mark with a WaterFurnace geothermal heatpump in my 3000sq ft rambler (1500ft with a finshed basement). The timing was right: my oil furnace, traditional A/C, and oil tank all needed to be replaced and the federal tax credit was about to drop from 26% to 22% last December.

It is a great system so far:

• Super quiet compared to the old oil rumbler
• The faint smell of oil is gone
• The fan runs a greater portion of each day, so the temperature variation between the finished basement and living floor
• My heating costs went from $1600/year to $600/year
• My cooling costs are about the same
• - If you like it very cool at night but warm during the day, geo may not be for you. It is very efficient at keeping a constant temperature but doesn't like swings. I set the auxiliary heat to only come on if the inside temp is >4 degrees below the t-stat setting.
• - During an extended power outage, you can't use a small generator to run the geo system as I did once in a snowstorm
• I didn't add the accessory for generating domestic hot water - that seems to only make sense if there is a LOT of demand across a lot of hours of each day (like a big family)

After all the incentives, the geo system was about $8000 more than traditional, so it's an 8 year payoff for the premium for geo.

My installer (Total Comfort in Hagerstown, MD) and their drilling partner have been in the geo business for a long time. My recommendations after a lot of research and my experience would be to use a WaterFurnace pump and go with a vendor that has a lot of experience. If I was building new, or needed a complete replacement, I would do geo again.

Pete

 

Last house had it with the loop running into our lake. System was right under 30k installed new. Inside unit lasted 20 years then took a shit. Obsolete unit so it had to be replaced at a cost of 13,500 for just the inside part. 3500sf house electric bill was always around 150 a month and house temp was a constant 67 degrees year round. Sold the house 2 years ago and cashed out. Would buy again. Super quiet systems

 

I'm still considering this for a new home in NV. The soil isn't as good for this system, and they are expensive as shit. I'm looking into wood chip or pellet furnace. Anybody got one?