Products For Your Home
Home Building and Renovations
Solar Hot Water
The technology for delivering hot potable water using the sun's energy has been around for quite some time. Today there are five basic types
of solar hot water sytems that can be installed in your home. Your decision regarding which system to use will be based on both the
number fo people living in the home and the overall climate of the area in which you live.
We at A Greener Home - BALTIMORE pride ourselves on providing simple, straightforward details that you need to make the best decision
possible for "greening" you home. However, in some cases we find that others have already done the research and hard work for us. So rather
than rehash or rewrite their material, we would rather just point you to the best information available on the subject in question.
In this case, we recommend that you read this excellent summary of Solar Hot Water systems provided
by Homepower Magazine.
An Important Note
Please note that, in our opinion, Solar Hot Water installations should only be considered if your are NOT considering, or cannot install,
a geothermal HVAC system. Today's advanced geothermal HVAC systems are usually installed with what is referred to as "hot water assist"
systems. During the summer months, hot water is supplied virtually for free. In the winter months, hot water is supplied at 400% efficiency. The
only time your geothermal HVAC system will not supply hot water is when it it turned off for a significant amount of time.
The photo below is an example of a geothermal HVAC system installed with "hot water assist". The hot water generated by the HVAC system is
routed to a storage tank (hot water heater not heating the water itself) shown on the right. The hot water heater (on the left) then pulls the
pre-heated water from the geothermal HVAC system storage tank.
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