Solar heating for the home heating and dom hot water

There needs to be more discussion about proper sizing of Solar Hot Water Systems.  There is an application for Exquisite Heat Control for solar injection to heating systems return water in the milder seasons.  By increasing the solar panels on the roof, the left over heat not needed for Domestic hot water can be put right into the Heating system.  By disconnecting the boiler fire, and analysis of the needed temperatures in the radiators, Exquisite Heat can operate a solar energy heat exchanger motor to warm the heating system return water to the needed temperature in the building or home.  This removes the condensation problem below 140 degrees. Thermostat analysis will determine the need for heating the return water.  The control can either inject Solar energy if greater than the return water temperature on demand from the thermostat, or it can fire the boiler to meet the miniumum demand temperatures nesded.  As days temperature changes twenty degrees from noon to 4 AM, the control can operate the total system.  This should save many BTU's from fuels over the years.  This method can also be employed with geothermal, heat pump systems

Cracking Boilers

Have you thought why boilers crack and have to be replaced?  It is not because they are old.  Modern boilers will last for ever.  The only reason to change them is to upgrade for AFUE Annual Fuel Use Efficiency .  The only reason to change is when they leak.  Now boiler leaks are a plumbers dream.  They are very expensive to repair, and cost lots of money.  There is nothing to do but fix it quick.  Your going to use the last guy to do it for you, because he is there now.  But what about avoiding the problem in the first place.  That requires knowledge of why it happens.  There are two basic reasons.

1. Boiler operators do not know about the temperature changes and methods of managing temperatures in boilers.  Always, the first solution to any heating problem is to raise the water temperature, to get heat fast.

2.  Many  heating controls turn the boiler off for many hours through the night, and then are turned on bringing cold water back to a cold boiler.  Over time this will ruin the boiler due to rapid reaction to quick water temperature changes.  It is a feast for boiler repair companies, and no one will tell the proper prevention for this.

We spend a lot of time educating managers and operators.  It's a great service and out building owners love the results.  Comfortable building residents and a more educated boiler room operator.  "More is not always better."   Call us and we can set you up with a trainer to help you keep your boilers healthy for many years to come. It's a great deal cheaper than replacement or expensive repairs.

How many buildings?

We have discussed the need for building to spend their fuel budget better, more comfortably and cheaper.  We are at the same time discussing reduction of the smoke up the stack.  If we reduce fuel use and increase comfort with a 10-30% reduction of smoke up the stack, major cities could have better air quality.  The price of oil would go down with less demand.

So why do we not do it.  The only answer I can think of, is the oil companies do not want to.  They do not want their political friends to talk about it. If the Politicians start talking about reducing the use of oil through conservation, the politicians do not get the contributions they need to stay in office. Now you can write this up into a book.  The truth is the truth.

What if government, oil  and gas companies, utilities, service contractors, boiler makers, all start telling you that they can save money and make you comfortable by simply putting a simple control on all heating devices.  That would be amazing.  And how many applications are there to make these efficient improvements.  Every occupied space in the country. Homes, buildings, schools, you name it.  There are at least 20,000,000 applications out there.  After you take care of giving comfort and efficiency to that 20,000,000 another 20,000,000 will come to mind.  So why are we not doing it??  Comment below and we will all learn a thing or two.

Precision Heating

What folks have not realized, is the waste heat from buildings.  This waste is measured by the comfort that is not had by uneven distribution or poor replacement of heat from building heat loss.

We know when it gets cold, the burner should go on and keep us warm.  That is what we pay for, right?  Well if you take a closer look, you will find that some heating systems do not come up soon enough and some come up too hot.  Either side of this discomfort point, the fuel used is being wasted.  If your not comfortable, your wasting the fuel you burn.  Buildings that provide uneven heat usually are wasting 10-30 % of their fuel.  The bills are higher than they should be and they are uncomfortable.  Occupants are unhappy, cannot sleep, have dry skin, have to get up all night to check the blankets on the kids.  The kids kick off the blankets when they are too hot and then they catchy cold when the building is cold.  Windows on the hot side are open, letting all that energy out. We all seem to put up with this discomfort.  We do not realize that it is totally  unnecessary. There is no reason for this condition to exist.

Buildings need to have boilers controlled, to achieve the exact heat loss analysis and heat replacement, every hour of the day.  There are controls in building that do nothing to address comfort.  They simply turn the heat on and off to satisfy the heat minimum law in the community.  Landlords do not realize that their buildings can be comfortable at the best economical expense.

Utilities maximize profits

For years Utilities have been required to make attempts to conserve on energy by doing requested energy audits.  They have offered free conversions to gas boilers from oil boilers.  They offer to install thermostats for air conditioning that they can set back over the Internet to reduce the load on the grid.  We will cover this subject in great depth.

I received a note with my bill some years ago with regard to the value and benefits of changing my boiler to natural gas from the oil that I had used for many years.  From an air pollution standpoint and the removal of the old oil tank at its risk of devaluing the property, I thought this is a good thing.  So I went further.

The additional cost for gas piping was expected.  The new boiler was delivered and installed.  I later removed the oil tank.  The men seemed very professional.  I was happy with the more reliable service from the gas boiler.  I began trying to see if I was saving any money on the switch.  I found that I was not.  I then decided to see what I could do to change that.,  My first notion was to do a boiler sizing survey to see if the boiler put in was a good size.  After the analysis I found I needed a 180,000 BTU boiler.  The one installed was a 300,000 BTU boiler.  So much for due diligence on the part of the gas company and its contractor.

Let's take a look at the electric side.  Many incentives have been induced to save energy for the utilities.  Most of these are used to reduce peak load periods.  The savings here are sold to the public as money saving as the electric rates are highest at the peak times.  Anything that looks like a shift or reduction from peak rates is good.  If you look at it from a utility point of view, this is great.  As society has more electric use from appliances and comfort equipment, the wires are being used to capacity.  With the normal peaks and vallies in the use pattern the wires are being stressed to the brown out point.  This is bad.  So the utility wants to flatten the use curve to avoid brown outs from the old wires, avoid having to put up new wires to your house and neighborhood, and make more money by delivering a higher average number of billable watts.  We are not really saving energy.  We are just spreading the use out so the wires can deliver more electricity with less power outage.