[Greenbuilding] Opinions on electric tankless HW heaters?

Clarke Olsen colsen at fairpoint.net
Thu Apr 21 08:24:42 CDT 2011


A green water heater, other then solar, is tough to be. I think that  
tankless electric is just the ticket for
certain applications, like sporadic use, or as a booster for solar.  
Putting the heater next to the use saves
a lot of water: water that you heated just a few hours ago...

Clarke Olsen
373 route 203
Spencertown, NY 12165
USA
518-392-4640
colsen at fairpoint.net




On Apr 20, 2011, at 10:21 PM, Nick Pyner wrote:

> I don't think your clients' (current) lifestyle has any bearing on the
> philosophy. You either design green or you don't. It may well be  
> that, with
> clients like this, not designing green is the best option and you are
> risking your reputation if you do. Further, if your clients have  
> any green
> building pretentions at all, they will know that a change in  
> lifestyle is
> the most obvious way to satisfy them. This may involve no more than  
> having
> their i-Phones reminding them to turn the heater off.
>
> There is no way a tankless electric can be considered green.
>
> If you live in an area with coal fired generators and variable tariff,
> re-read the above line about five times.
>
> Much the same applies to electric storage, but to a lesser degree.  
> At least
> you might have an option to use off-peak rates.
>
> Small use and second homes was indeed the most typical use of tankless
> heaters well back in the 20th century, but we are now well into the  
> 21st.
>
> You do not need to keep electric-heated stored water hot all the time.
> Timers with "day omit" have been around for as long as your  
> grandmother can
> remember, and there are plenty of sophisticated programmable timers  
> around.
> There are probably remote control devices too. I bet you can do it  
> over the
> internet or, if you can't, you will be able to next week. It has to be
> simpler than having the fridge email the supermarket, and they are  
> doing
> that already.
>
> Not that I'm advocating electric storage. I submit that gas instant  
> is a
> greener proposition and better practice but, at the risk of citing the
> bleeding obvious, solar may be better practice still....
>
>
>
> Nick Pyner
>
> Dee Why   NSW
>
>
>
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