want a quick home energy audit in CT? fax or mail your application! they MAY get back to you in a month or two! “no you can’t call. no there’s no web form. no you can’t have confirmation of receipt. go away.”

[applause]

oh, wise guy, eh. if you’ve got time to applaud, why don’t you go do your own damn audit.*

*actual local utility web site suggestion. apparently, many utilities with overloaded grids and exploding energy production costs have not yet learned about the whole opt-in/opt-out dynamic.

Yup. Hot water baseboard is a very limiting heating system in that it can only use high grade heat rather than the relatively low grade heat that a heat pump provides. There isn’t enough radiant area to effectively heat the room when it gets cold outside. That’s why I installed in-floor radiant heat in my new house – it keeps a lot of options open.

There may be a potential solution to retrofitting a baseboard heating system that doesn’t involve ripping most of your house apart. I’ve considered the idea, but never discussed it with anyone who really knows what they’re doing wrt installation methods and costs. Since the problem of using low grade heat is a lack of radiation area, the solution is to (cost-effectively) add radiation area. The addition of fan-coil units in most rooms could provide the additional radiation. The heat pump heats water that is circulated through the existing baseboard plumbing, with fan-coil units spliced into the piping. The cost of doing this still might be a deal-breaker, though.

hapa also said: “and air-source, while quickly improving at low temperature, requires ducts in the house”

Not necessarily. Although there aren’t nearly as many models to choose from, you can find an air-source heat pump with a hot water output. Again, it’s low grade heat that is suitable for radiant heat, or possibly my fan-coil idea.

Good luck with your retrofit.

Here’s what I did with my house with baseboard radiators: First I improved the envelope, so the heat needed was less. Then I added some panel radiators, and I run 100 F to 105 F water from a heat pump through both new and old radiators. Cheaper than adding ducts, and quieter and more efficient.

at the same time, there are fairly small properties with older septic systems leaving little room to drill even closed-loop wells; and air-source, while quickly improving at low temperature, requires ducts in the house that the older houses don’t have or can’t fit without big interior changes.

houston doesn’t have a problem but along the housatonic, yes, problem.

AND you could plow that $2,000 extra per year into energy saving items. you could buy a whole lot of LEDs and CFLs. You could probably within 3-5 years of saving $2,000/year with your geothermal heat pump be able to pay cash for a solar panel system. so in 5-8 years you could be saving thousands a year and maybe put that into a solar hot water heater. so in ten years or fifeteen your geothermal heat pump could have saved you enough money to buy a solar panel system, as many LEDS and CFLs as you’d ever need and a solar hot water system.

sounds good to me.

A system that costs $10k and pays for itself in 5 years would mean an annual savings of $2k per year once the initial costs are returned. (And possibly even more if inflation/rising fuel costs are included.)

Money that would have to be spent if the old technology were still being used.

(Lots of people don’t have finely tuned financial thinking.)