Thread: Winter heating systems

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I've been following the discussion here on burning hydrogen for fuel in a car.
Since the experts are predicting this coming winter is going to cost the average home $5000 to heat with oil, I'm looking at replacing our old inefficient oil fired furnace with a high efficient gas furnace.

Then I started thinking of the possibility of using the Hydroboost theory to use for a heating system.

I was thinking on the grounds that the new energy efficiant refrigerators use lower power compressors and they actually run more but use less energy. If you have a low powered furnace the burns at a slower rate but for a longer period you wouldn't need a large quantity of hydrogen at one time.

Are there any experts here in the home heating field who might have seen or heard of doing this. Just generating the hydrogen on demand, not storing a large tank of it?
Can the hydrogen generate enough heat to heat an average home?

Since nobody doing the auto installation is interested in doing the calculations beforehand, here are some data for you to use: 20.9 lbs of hydrogen is the energy equivalent of 55 lbs of gasoline. There are 50,957 Btu/lb of energy in hydrogen. Figure your gasoline consumption in lb/hr and you can figure your hydrogen requirements...at full hydrogen use OR at supplemental use.

It takes approximately 125 units of energy to manufacture 100 units of hydrogen energy. Therefore, unless you have some "free" source of energy (like the sun or geothermal), the net conversion is a loss.

Next research should be how much water it takes to generate a pound of hydrogen.

[QUOTE=robot]

It takes approximately 125 units of energy to manufacture 100 units of hydrogen energy. Therefore, unless you have some "free" source of energy (like the sun or geothermal), the net conversion is a loss.

QUOTE]

My cousin Jim has a geothermal system in a completely rebuilt 3 story, 7 bedroom farm house... It was my great-great grandfathers' homestead....His average heating and cooling expense is around $60.00 a month....He just doesn't like to talk about the initial install expense... If I were to build new, definitely the way I would go!!!!

i have 50 acres of woods , im gettin a wood stove weather the old woman likes it or not!! ok ok sense i think she lurks this joint , im gettin one for the man cave

An old miner where I lived in Colorado told me a rule of thumb was, to heat a cabin for the winter, you need the equivalent cabin volume of wood. I had a 25 X 20 X 8 ft building and cut 15 cords of wood (1 cord is 128 cu ft). Sure enough, half way thru the winter, I ran out of wood.

If you have geothermal available, it is semi easy to heat with it if the water is free of a lot of minerals. I have seen reports of pipes plugging up if the water is heavy mineralized.

I still think that there is enough hot air in Washington, DC to solve our energy problems.

[My cousin Jim has a geothermal system in a completely rebuilt 3 story, 7 bedroom farm house... It was my great-great grandfathers' homestead....His average heating and cooling expense is around $60.00 a month....He just doesn't like to talk about the initial install expense... If I were to build new, definitely the way I would go!!!![/QUOTE]

Dave,
Tell me more about his system.
Tom

Originally Posted by Tom F

[My cousin Jim has a geothermal system in a completely rebuilt 3 story, 7 bedroom farm house... It was my great-great grandfathers' homestead....His average heating and cooling expense is around $60.00 a month....He just doesn't like to talk about the initial install expense... If I were to build new, definitely the way I would go!!!!

Dave,
Tell me more about his system.
Tom[/QUOTE]

Not a real expert on it Tom, a bunch of wells with a pump and tubing in the basement...South of here a ways, we could go visit next time your over here if you want??? He loves to show it off!!!!

Geothermal heat pumps work because below the frost line in the ground, the temputure is reletivaly the same all year round, generally about 53*.

Dave,
That would be great!
Also I would like to bring the chassis out either next week or the week after, stay a day or two so we can bolt on the body and other sheetmetal and then leave it for you to finish your part so you can bring it back or for me to come and get later. What will work best for you?
Tom

Have to see how the rest of the week goes...Ask me again about Monday or so... Got to get the box finished and installed on my '71, it's in the garage now taking up way too much room!!!!!!

Originally Posted by Dave Severson

Dave,
Tell me more about his system.
Tom

Not a real expert on it Tom, a bunch of wells with a pump and tubing in the basement...South of here a ways, we could go visit next time your over here if you want??? He loves to show it off!!!![/QUOTE]

Sounds like some sort of heat pump system to me.

Ya I know they use a Heat Pump and some systems sink plastic tubing in the ground and run a solution. I would like to see how it works and what the cost is for it.

I've heard it's a pretty good system,just might be a little expensive initially due to the extra well and heat exchangers. Some places have outlawed them because you do mess with the ground temperature and the watertable. I wish I had looked into the system more before replacing my boiler last year. I did cut my oil bill almost in half,but now with the price doubled what did I gain? I hear they can make vegetable oil for @$.66 a gallon,I'd love to figure out how to burn that instead. Even if it needs 5 times as much oil,I'd still be ahead at that price. Hank

My son-in-law did away with his hot water heater and replaced it with an electric "heat-on-demand" unit popular in Europe. It uses 220V to quickly heat the water in the pipe as it comes out the faucet. Although that is still electric heat it is only "on" when you turn on the hot water line. In my house in winter you have to run the hot water a few minutes to get the hot water from the heater to the wash basin at the other end of the house, thus wasting water.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder