Solar Thermal Aquarium Heating?

[jschall]

Guy I am king jackass when the moment takes me. I know how to spot it. Never **** a ****ter.

Were I saying my original post in real life, it would be with a humorous tone. The Internet has trouble conveying such things.

Hence the control scheme. Solar thermal water heaters are insulated gathering systems that collect solar energy while insulating against convective losses to the outside environment. You use a control scheme so that when it's dark or cold or overcast and the collector temperature is cooler than the desired tank temperature, the water doesn't get circulated through the collector. I would still need a backup electrical system to maintain tank temperature on rainy days and at night, but the solar collector system absorbs a large portion of the energy burden.

Sounds like a waste of time and effort if you need a regular heater anyway. Most people run their AC at around 78-80 in the summer anyway, so it wouldn't even be used much since the water in the solar heater would usually be cold in the winter.

So.. Hang on. You're saying, you have a 10,000w photovoltaic system running your house, but you're poopooing the idea of solar thermal water heating (which, generally speaking is quite a bit more efficient than photovoltaic energy capture). I'm totally confused.

Yes, but just like with your solar heater, I have to use (probably coal) power from the electric company during the night and when it's overcast. The reason I don't really care too much about my power consumption is that my power bill is negligible anyway, as power from the solar system is sold to the electric company when I'm not using it.

 

[KaiserSousay]

10,000w photovoltaic system

Sorry to wander a bit from topic..but
What was your "startup cost" for your system?

 

[Ramesh]

I am thinking well over US $50,000 for a 10KW Solar electricity setup.

 

[jschall]

Sorry to wander a bit from topic..but
What was your "startup cost" for your system?

After tax incentives it came out to $64,000.