Geothermal
 

Anyone have any experience with or better yet, have a Geothermal HVAC system installed in their home? Seems like this is the future and I'm thinking of taking advantage of the gov't rebates to have a system like this installed. I've done some research and talked to one contractor briefly, but it would be nice to hear first hand from an actual homeowner. Ballpark price for a 2,000 sq ft home? Don't have a large enough property for a horizontal loop, so looks like a vertical.

Looked into a few years back for a city lot (vertical bore), estimates were close to $20k for a 1700sqft house.

I priced it out once.
 

I while back I priced out the cost and the rebate stuff. In the end, the most cost effective was an air exchange heat pump. Last year in kamloops the furnace ran for about 1 week just at night, the rest of the time the heat pump ran everything.

The cost of installing the geo- system was about 20K, and I got a 95% furnace and heat pump (after grants) for about 5K. My annual heat bill is not at about $180, so the pay back is only a few years (and the furance and air-con were dead anyways).
The payback on geo-thermal is like 20 years. If you have to go vertical for the lines the cost go way up.

At my "other" property though it is an option because I have 2 choices. In the back acre we are filling in about 8 ft of fill. So I can just place the lines and then fill over. Or the other option if I can get the permit is to use a ground-water loop (place is lake front and has well water supply). So you just use ground water that goes back into the ground rather than installing the lines in the first place.

Unless you can get a real good deal on the install and contract/do some work yourself. The installers are just to high in price, which always struck me as annoying because I know what the geo-thermal units are worth themselves. So I really have a hard time figuring out where the extra 10K worth of cost comes from. (possibly permit and inspections costs?)

don't want to side line this thread, but could you PM me some information of what you got (brands and such and who did the install) I need to replace the furnace in the houe I bought soon, the AC is fairly new but just buying a furnace is almost 5K on its own.

Steve

Thanks for all the input so far, I figured somewhere between 20 & 30K. The heat pump sounds like it may be a great alternative. My home is an older bungalow with roughly 1,000 sq ft upper level and same for the basement. The furnace is good but is certainly not new and I no longer use the central air since it dates back to the '70's and is pretty much toast. Even with the Okanagan heat waves in the summer, I've been able to stay fairly comfy by opening the windows at night - it cools off fairly well overnight in Vernon, even in mid-summer. I have one of those 4 in 1 moveable air conditioner, de humidifier, heater, fan units that gets me through the times when a heat wave lasts for a couple of weeks or more. Even though my place was built in the early '60s, the insulation is quite good particularly in the attic.

I'll have to do a little more research now and decide whether I'm prepared to blow the big bucks on geo thermal and deal with the 20 year pay back (I may not live that long) or maybe do the heat pump instead. I'm also redoing all of the flooring and have installed electric loop heating under tiles at my bay window in the L/R. Will probably do the same in the kitchen, bathroom and sun room. So after all that, geo thermal may be overkill if I can get away with a heat pump instead. Either way, I definitely want to take advantage of the grant, make the gov't pay...

I had a couple of questions on the heat pump, I looked at a few sites and am considering one for my place. We're on Propane which has gotten ridiculously expensive lately.

Does yours function as an air cooling unit in the summer as well? What sort of effect has it had on your electric bill (both summer and winter)? It's easy to say the gas bill is down but if the electric bill goes up by the same amount you're not really saving anything.

The house I just bought is build full ICF walls, it is 1900 sq ft, with no basement. It is running a geothermal system with both in floor heat as well as forced air through an air exchange heat pump. There is also an electric instant heat box on the in floor if it needs a boost.

The home owner boasted $80/mo electric bill on the budget year round, but Manitoba has low rates;

Energy Charge:
First 900 kWh @ 6.25¢/kWh
Balance of kWh @ 6.30¢/kWh

The one contractor I spoke with mentioned that to convert using my current forced air system, the geothermal installation would provide supplemental heat through electricity when required. I assume the inside unit will include heating elements to do this. I think in the long run, electrical power is more sustainable than natural gas or propane since those are both fossil fuels and the well will run dry at some point. Perhaps not in our lifetime and natural gas is still relatively inexpensive compared to electricity, but there's lots of sun available in the Okanagan, so with the improvements in solar panel technology as well as wind power, it's only a matter of time before the tide turns. Some time in the future, maybe not that far, the major utilities will get a rude awakening, somewhat akin to what the financial sector and auto industry are currently experiencing. A dose of reality. By having a geothermal system, you are in effect, your own utility. As more and more people buy into this technology, prices will drop. De-centralized utilities will become more prevalent. Wind farms may be an eyesore, but they don't mess with air quality and there's no fear of oil spills with tankers traveling half way around the world to deliver the goods, not to mention ruptured pipelines.... Ok, now I'm really off on a tangent.

Good info being brought forward here though, thanks again & keep it coming.

you can get them with natural gas suplemental heat also if you already have it.

Steve

Thanks for the heads up, my current system is natural gas. I am renovating the flooring as well and will be putting in electric radiant heating under tiles in several rooms, so if I go this route, in the end, I may not need much, if any, supplemental, it'll already be there.

answering a few questions at once.
 

Well, the company I dealt with here in kamloops, I have deal with quite a few times before, and the owner is pretty honest.

I DID get a lower than average pricing -- mostly to me NOT being in a hurry. I waited 4 months to get it installed. When I got the quote/pricing it was the middle of summer and he was BUSY. So, I did get a good price, but I had to wait until he wasn't already paying his installers overtime and the guys needed the extra work.

The heat pump does both heat and A/C the house. :lol:

As for the efficiency, you MUST get a variable speed DC fan in the furnace. I have a bryant furnace and heat pump unit now, and the control unit is what saves all the money. Newer heat pumps can only heat the house down to approx -8 degrees. However, what they actually do is this:

The heat pump kicks in when the temp starts to drop in the house. It runs and runs, but if it doesn't raise the temp in a reasonable amount of time, the furnace kicks in instead. The amount of heat that comes out depends on the outside temperature. changing the fan speed "sets" the temperature difference, so the variable speed can run the heat pump in colder weather.
In the case of my place -- it was running down to -19 before the furnace would kick in. (I added insulation as well).

The first thing you'll want to do is get the "eco-energy assesment" done. It is really worth the $150 even if you don't do anything that can get a grant. After it is done, they send you a booklet with a list of improvements and how much they will save you per year. It has been about 1 year since the install and the number on the assesment have been +/- 3%, which is really, really close.

My gas bills are now about $13 (from 80) and my hydro is up $20. I do like in a 1800 sqft townhouse, so with a large house your saving will be MORE. But that is what the assesment can tell you. It figured about $600 a year saving with a heat pump and attic insulation.

If you are on propane -- wow, get one. At my "other" place we have electric heat, which is about the same cost as propane. electric heat is 100% efficient, meaning for each watt of power 1 watt goes to heat. Most heat pumps are around 260%. So about 1/3 the heating cost.

I can't help but laugh at my wife's family. They paid 5K for a new mid-efficient furnace with now grants and no A/C.

By the time everything is said and done, we are getting about $5000 in grants, some for insulation, some for the heat pump, some for the furnace, some for air sealing etc.

Basically the heat pump cost about $500 more than the grants. But if you factor that just getting central A/C is a few grand, it is cheaper to get the heat pump than just the A/C (heat pump are about $1000 more than A/C)


Whew -- Now, just to tick off the heating companies. There is quite a mark up on the furnace and heat pump. So, even though I had most quotes for the high-efficiency furnace (95%) and heat pump around 11-12K, in the end the bill was $8700. So yes, they can come down that much. And with the current down-turn in the economy, it might even be a bit more.

If you have a 200 amp main electrical service, you might be able to get away with an electric furnace instead of a gas furnace as well. I would have loved to cut the gas of completely and not pay $11 a month just as a basic charge :(

yes $11 of my $13 bill is the basic connection charge

Don't forget, it is all PST exempt as well :)

The only main diff between air exchange heat pump and geo-thermal is that you don't need backup heat.

Awesome Wolf, thank you for the very comprehensive breakdown. Need to get that energy assessment done ASAP.