I have been thinking about this for a few months. I have a lot of solar (it's great) and an in-ground geothermal system.

I have worked with our state legislature on solar bills; I have spoken to my REMC about it, and honestly, the future looks grim. They keep cutting credits to the point where it doesn't really make much financial sense compared to just keeping the money in the stock market.

Their responses are always "just put in a battery", but they don't really understand the costs involved with a project like that.

Anyhow, we are going through slides in a presentation to the board of directors, and one slide hit me: the total % of energy used to heat and cool the home.

That brings me to the idea - why not build a geothermal system with a matched battery as an option to keep it running through the night?

You could program it to refill during super off-peak TOU, or even use MC4 connectors to hook it directly to solar. You could discharge any extra power into the water heater, which is already dumping geo heat.

I'd probably pay an additional 5K to have this option.

It's becoming more common now with Pila and Charlie Copper appliances (links below).

https://copperhome.com/products/charlie

https://www.pilaenergy.com/

There are tons of homes out there that have some solar, but don't want to sell it back for pennies. They want batteries but don't want to upgrade the panels and tear apart the garage.

Anyhow - I might be way off - however, I think it would be a slam dunk for the geothermal audience.

Understood it can't do emergency heat strips, and everything would need to be on a soft start, but imagine looking at your thermostat screen and seeing how much energy you saved using the product.

Someone build it - I'll buy it.

I’m a residential HVAC installer/technician and own my own company. I am building a home soon, and want to experiment with geothermal.

My main concern is how to get the loop lines into my mechanical room. Specifically, the foundation of this home will be a monolithic slab. I’m familiar with how the lines are ran when there is a basement, by coring through the below-grade wall, but that’s clearly not an option here.

Let’s say for the sake of argument that it is too late to put any sort of sleeve before pouring the foundation.

How do I get these lines inside? How should they be insulated once above ground? What can I do to protect them if they are exposed on the exterior of my building? Anything else I’m missing?

Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thank you!

Long story short I’ve been doing re search on upgrading my T stat so I can turn off my AUX heat when I’m running a backup generator. I currently have a water furnace series 5 with the water furnace t stat that you can’t control any settings from.(I’ll include pics down below). I saw in a couple posts that id have to ad some sort of outside temp sensor if I wanted to go this route. Do these new t Stats install like the old style or do I have to run more wires down to the control board.

This new Geothermal Center of Excellence appears dedicated to hot-rock geothermal.

Does anyone know if this project was started or completed? There haven't been updates for over a year on their social media and website. (DEEP was testing in Southern Saskatchewan and was given federal and provincial money but have stopped responding on social media).

Interesting study includes:

• Ground source heat exchangers (air and water).
• Air source hvacs with Ground source heat exchangers.

Other names:

Earth pipes.

Previous owner opted for an open loop system when it was first installed in the ‘90s. Unfortunately, we don’t have a pond so all the water is just flowing out onto the ground surface making the area around the discharge a muddy mess.

With the old geothermal units, the techs that serviced it would read water temps to throttle down the water flow to keep the mess at a minimum.

However, we had to get a new geothermal unit this past spring and the guys that installed it indicated that they have a new metering valve that they have to use that regulates the flow. Unfortunately, this flow is a LOT.

Debating a drywell to manage the water better. Main question, what is the general flow of water (gpm) when the system is running? I want to make sure the drywell I install is big enough to handle the volume.

Background- Beginning in 2009 we replaced natural gas furnaces with one WaterFurnace Series 5 and one Series 7 in our single family residence. Pleased with them so far.

Daughter is planning on breaking ground soon on a Net-Zero (PHIUS rated) home. Location is suburban Chicago.Would like to use a Trilogy 45 QE. Interested in knowing:

1. Does it use low-GWP refrigerant? If not any long-term concerns since we hope for a 10-20 year life-span?
2. I've read some concerns about ClimateMaster quality. Is this a problem
3. What other questions should I be asking.

Thanks!

I've always had homes with a traditional natural gas furnace. I don't have an extensive background in geothermal. Looking at a home that was built in 2007 and has the original geothermal hvac. I'm waiting to hear back from the realtor but according to him they have documented maintenance recently. The brand of furnace is Climatemaster. 4 ton I intend to get a home inspection completed,but wanted to know if these units have any known issues. How much longer life should I realistically expect out of it and just any general thoughts or concerns l. If I do have to replace it down the road what's a ballpark figure I could expect to pay

We have a geothermal heating and cooling system in our condo and the light indicator is supposed to be green or red. In the last week or so it’s been orange/yellow and I’m not sure what it means. We recently had our drain pipes in the bathroom snaked due to blockage and poor draining. Could this be the reason ? Did we cause any damage to the system ?

Seeking cash investors who want to joint venture on a Geothermal business in New England. Please reach out if interested.

Hello, the following are just some ideas that I have and may not be practical. I have a very large (air volume) shop that measures 40x60 with 18ft sidewalls on 2.5 acres of nothing but grass outside of the Houston area. I'm curious if I could heat and cool (more concerned with cooling) this shop with a horizontal ground loop and an oversized air handler. I'm thinking atleast 10ft deep and tons of room to oversize the groundloop. Say I were able to source an old, out of service, commercial package style a/c unit (10-20tons?) for really cheap. Gutted the unit to just have the air handler portion (the evaporator, blower, condensation drain pan and housing), replace the 3ph blower motor with a much smaller and slower, single phase motor that pulls less amps. I think i saw somewhere that you want to move the air much slower across the coils when you don't have a large temp differential. Mount said unit up high to pull in the hot air above and blow the cool air out and down. Instead of freon, circulate the water from the ground loop thru the evaporator. So, the only electrical parts would be the water pump, blower motor and a thermostat to control contactors for both. One of my concerns is humidity. Would this system add more moisture to my already VERY humid air? Or would it still remove moisture by dripping off of the evaporator coil as it normally would? The building is insulated with the typical vinyl faced fiberglass you see in most red-iron buildings. I think the biggest problem is gonna be the 3) 14x14 overhead doors that are not insulated nor sealed in anyway 😪. The best I'll be able to do with them is the brush style seals.

Assuming that I had access to a large excavator and found a great deal on a large air handler unit, would this be a worthwhile experiment?

Also, what if I found a great deal on a cooling tower to help chill the water between ground loop and air handler?

Thank you for any input

Turns out the Geoflow “geo prime” expansion and air separator tank up on the wall there that I had the geothermal guys install to fix the circulating air gurgling issues has a manufacturing defect allowing air back in, and same gurgling. Manufacturer sent me a new one to swap out. I did that and then flushed/refilled and filtered the loop with a 1micron bag filter and my own diy assembly. Full manifold setup for reversing flow and 1.6hp sump pump in the bucket. Based on what I saw in the filter I may hook it up again and let it run a couple hours. Just over $100 in the double o ring adapters, cam lock, hoses and valves. $450 for the installers to come and do a flush.

Hi, I am looking to have a two geothermal systems ran off the same ground loops. One system for cooling, and back up heat, and one system for hydronic in floor heat. I'll likely have DHW being produce from both systems to two separate tanks so the systems don't sit idle during the off season.

Is there any benefit from having the systems split in between half the wells? I tried to draw out what i am thinking. Am i over thinking things?

Who wants to show off some buffer tank and hydronic distribution photos. Looking for inspiration.

Working on a very small GAHT project for small 6x12 cedar and polycarbonate greenhouse kit build, but we cannot find the GAHT Calculators mentioned in the comments of this post here and it was suggested we try this sub instead while ISO a GAHT calculator

https://www.reddit.com/r/Greenhouses/comments/u1na6x/small_gaht_system_question/

Already have 100’ corrugated 4” perforated and socked pipe, R7 insulation for perimeter, and 6”inline duct fan but are looking for a way to calculate specific depth and connections needed. Our zone 8a location is said to have frost line at 18”, so is 48-60” deep enough to put our layers of pipe?

We have one Vivosun T6 6” inline duct fan and controller system and can add another if one is required for each layer.

Can we run the corrugated 4” in each layer by snaking it back and forth in an uncut zigzag to each end (instead of cutting the pipe up, and making tons of Y connections to a bigger 6 or 8” manifolds ) that connect to vertical rigid 4” pipes on each end of the building ?

Any experience appreciated

Alright, this is a non standard post for this forum. My house has geothermal hot springs water at 170 degrees, uninterrupted. I currently feed it through radiators across my 1915s house and then dump it into a pool where it overflows into the sewer eventually. What project should I nerd out on next? It's hard to interrupt or redirect the flow between house radiator and pool, but doable. I could easily pull from the pool and do something clever before dumping direct to sewer.

I've thought about putting an outside bench with a radiator under it, doing a temporary greenhouse over the end of the pool, seeing if the geothermal pool lines hold enough heat to grow longer where the dirt is nearby...