I plan to add an air- to-water heatpump to my existing baseboard radiatiors/boiler set up. I will leave the existing boiler as a backup source (also known as a bivalent system), as I don't want to replace any radiators and I am not sure yet if the current radiators will be able to heat the house at a lower water temp. That way...I can use the heat pump for most fall/winter days, and use the boiler on super cold days (if needed). It should be an easy system to install to the existing boiler system...just a heat pump and buffer tank...with a few mixing valves and/or a heat exchanger.
Radiant heat requires 180°F water circulating for proper efficient heating, which boiler provides, as long as heat pump heats up to that temp your good
This looks really cool. I would like to know more, price of the unit, also didn't show what the delivery system, without ducts how do you bring air into the room? Just circulation? We need more info on this!!
Do you know if this system could integrate into a building that currently has Whalen units installed in individual apartments? As with your system this building's system circulates water (either hot or cold) to provide heat or cold air. It has to be switched over twice a year since it can do only one or the other at a time. Thanks
@matthewvanrossum406 The cold water goes to a wall mounted fan coil unit that has a small fan, some coils and a pan that catches any condensate during cooling. The fan coil unit has a power supply, two plumbing connections and a condensate. We used a washer/dryer box behind it to drain the water away. Ben Bogie did a video on the fan coil units for this house that will hopefully be posted soon that describes (and shows) this.
Not sure of the ROI, but the electric rates are cheap at around 14 cents/kWhr. The value for the client was getting rid of the ductwork, getting cooling (they had none prior), getting off of fossil fuels, replacing their gas water heater and having a quiet system with demand response. This was of greater value to them than the ROI of just the dollars and cents.
Thanks. That’s about my current gross kWh rate. This was a little different than other solutions I had seen. What is the typical electric load that the system draws? Is there any backup water heating? (Sorry if you already answered)
Since you are using wall mounted fan coils for distribution, and no existing hydronic infrastructure, it would be interesting to hear your reasoning on why an air to water system is better than running refrigerant indoors as is the standard practice today with heat pumps in the US. I'll list the ones I picked up on: 1. It can do domestic hot water heating provided customer gets an indirect tank. Doesn't need another compressor running in the utility room and would likely be much faster recovery than the stand alone heat pump water heater units. 2. The ability to store heat in a buffer tank for later use. However, that was a pretty small tank, I'm not sure how useful this is for demand shifting. Let's say a 40 gallon tank at delta T 30F stores about 3kWh of thermal energy. Its something, could last an hour or two with a pretty small load. Feels like the tank would need to be enormous before this is significant. 3. Reduced refrigerant leakage and later the ability to use R290 as I'm not sure that will ever be allowed to be piped inside the home. Those are really exciting to me, but not sure homeowners would demand that, I think EPA would have to ban R410a and R32, R454b before this is significant but curious to hear your thoughts. 4. Can be used directly into existing hydronic infrastructure, especially radiant floors, but this is rare in most homes and didn't sound like this was the case in your project. Did I miss any? I think reason 3 alone is enough to do it, but not sure its marketable to consumers. I think refrigerants are run indoors now because its one less heat exchanger and no hydronic circulators, no freeze protection, thus a simpler, maybe more efficient and lower cost system. Could all that be overcome to make air to water heat pumps the best solution for homes that don't have hydronic distribution planned or already in place?
In my opinion the turning point will be making completely integrated hydronic systems as easy to design, install and operate as mini splits. Now they have to be custom designed and built for each house, which has its own advantages (like not being tied to a single manufacturer for the whole system, and if well designed providing exceptional comfort). I think this will still be the best option for new builds and big renovations, but having something more plug and play will open up many more opportunities, as they will be easier to install as incremental updates, more professional figures will be able to install them, and arguably they may eventually become even easier to DYI install than mini splits as you wouldn't have to manage any refrigerant gas, since it can be all packaged in the outdoor unit
It has wall mounted fan coil units for this project that we will be showing in a subsequent video. Any number of different ceiling cassettes, in wall units, wall mounted units, in floor or in wall distribution are available and can be used. If one is doing cooling, one wants to use the fan coil units that have condensate drains. It is technically possible to retrofit into existing baseboard, but it is highly unlikely the loads would match and one couldn't do cooling as it would create a lot of condensate.
Why are you showing this when it is not available to home builders? How much does this cost? Do they make just a Water Heater unit or Tankless Water Heater Unit. Is it even affordable for the average homeowner?
The system is rated for cold climates and has a heat pan on the outdoor unit. The water lines get insulated and if the temp goes below freezing the system will reverse to put hot water in the lines to keep them from freezing. If there is a power outage, the outdoor unit drains so it won't get damaged.
Yea whats the cost of that control system? In my experience thats going to be the first thing to fail and it cost 80% of what the entire system cost... 👎
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So how do geothermal coils tie into this? Is there a second video that shows more of the system?
I plan to add an air- to-water heatpump to my existing baseboard radiatiors/boiler set up. I will leave the existing boiler as a backup source (also known as a bivalent system), as I don't want to replace any radiators and I am not sure yet if the current radiators will be able to heat the house at a lower water temp. That way...I can use the heat pump for most fall/winter days, and use the boiler on super cold days (if needed). It should be an easy system to install to the existing boiler system...just a heat pump and buffer tank...with a few mixing valves and/or a heat exchanger.
I assume you would have to manually switch to the boiler or heat pump?
Radiant heat requires 180°F water circulating for proper efficient heating, which boiler provides, as long as heat pump heats up to that temp your good
So if i switch to air-to-water i will only get audio on the left?
Lol, sorry about that...
This looks really cool. I would like to know more, price of the unit, also didn't show what the delivery system, without ducts how do you bring air into the room? Just circulation? We need more info on this!!
The Aris outdoor unit looks identical to the MBtek Apollo air to water heat pump unit. Are they the same with different names?
Do you know if this system could integrate into a building that currently has Whalen units installed in individual apartments? As with your system this building's system circulates water (either hot or cold) to provide heat or cold air. It has to be switched over twice a year since it can do only one or the other at a time.
Thanks
@matthewvanrossum406 The cold water goes to a wall mounted fan coil unit that has a small fan, some coils and a pan that catches any condensate during cooling. The fan coil unit has a power supply, two plumbing connections and a condensate. We used a washer/dryer box behind it to drain the water away. Ben Bogie did a video on the fan coil units for this house that will hopefully be posted soon that describes (and shows) this.
I want to see the Fan units, prices. And how effective and quick can it cool/heat a room.
That’s an interesting system. What’s the ROI time and what are the electric utility rates at the site?
Not sure of the ROI, but the electric rates are cheap at around 14 cents/kWhr. The value for the client was getting rid of the ductwork, getting cooling (they had none prior), getting off of fossil fuels, replacing their gas water heater and having a quiet system with demand response. This was of greater value to them than the ROI of just the dollars and cents.
Thanks.
That’s about my current gross kWh rate.
This was a little different than other solutions I had seen.
What is the typical electric load that the system draws? Is there any backup water heating? (Sorry if you already answered)
Can you run in floor heating and domestic hot water with that unit or would I need a separate on demand hot water for drinking water, sink, shower. ?
Yes to both
Since you are using wall mounted fan coils for distribution, and no existing hydronic infrastructure, it would be interesting to hear your reasoning on why an air to water system is better than running refrigerant indoors as is the standard practice today with heat pumps in the US. I'll list the ones I picked up on:
1. It can do domestic hot water heating provided customer gets an indirect tank. Doesn't need another compressor running in the utility room and would likely be much faster recovery than the stand alone heat pump water heater units.
2. The ability to store heat in a buffer tank for later use. However, that was a pretty small tank, I'm not sure how useful this is for demand shifting. Let's say a 40 gallon tank at delta T 30F stores about 3kWh of thermal energy. Its something, could last an hour or two with a pretty small load. Feels like the tank would need to be enormous before this is significant.
3. Reduced refrigerant leakage and later the ability to use R290 as I'm not sure that will ever be allowed to be piped inside the home. Those are really exciting to me, but not sure homeowners would demand that, I think EPA would have to ban R410a and R32, R454b before this is significant but curious to hear your thoughts.
4. Can be used directly into existing hydronic infrastructure, especially radiant floors, but this is rare in most homes and didn't sound like this was the case in your project.
Did I miss any? I think reason 3 alone is enough to do it, but not sure its marketable to consumers. I think refrigerants are run indoors now because its one less heat exchanger and no hydronic circulators, no freeze protection, thus a simpler, maybe more efficient and lower cost system. Could all that be overcome to make air to water heat pumps the best solution for homes that don't have hydronic distribution planned or already in place?
In my opinion the turning point will be making completely integrated hydronic systems as easy to design, install and operate as mini splits. Now they have to be custom designed and built for each house, which has its own advantages (like not being tied to a single manufacturer for the whole system, and if well designed providing exceptional comfort). I think this will still be the best option for new builds and big renovations, but having something more plug and play will open up many more opportunities, as they will be easier to install as incremental updates, more professional figures will be able to install them, and arguably they may eventually become even easier to DYI install than mini splits as you wouldn't have to manage any refrigerant gas, since it can be all packaged in the outdoor unit
When using it for cooling how does it deal with condensation??
You need to drain it from each fan coil unit
baseboard heat or floor radiant? Does it retrofit into existing baseboard?
It has wall mounted fan coil units for this project that we will be showing in a subsequent video. Any number of different ceiling cassettes, in wall units, wall mounted units, in floor or in wall distribution are available and can be used. If one is doing cooling, one wants to use the fan coil units that have condensate drains. It is technically possible to retrofit into existing baseboard, but it is highly unlikely the loads would match and one couldn't do cooling as it would create a lot of condensate.
Why are you showing this when it is not available to home builders? How much does this cost? Do they make just a Water Heater unit or Tankless Water Heater Unit. Is it even affordable for the average homeowner?
The Refrigerant that is used is R32 not R32a.
How do you keep the water in the outside unit from freezing?
Antifreeze? Like gshp?
The system is rated for cold climates and has a heat pan on the outdoor unit. The water lines get insulated and if the temp goes below freezing the system will reverse to put hot water in the lines to keep them from freezing. If there is a power outage, the outdoor unit drains so it won't get damaged.
@@JoshSalinger Thanks Josh.
Create coolth lol
Personally, I anm VERY cooth.
There is no such thing as R32A. It's just R32.
Yeah and (here in Europe at least) most new heat pumps are using R290
Yea whats the cost of that control system? In my experience thats going to be the first thing to fail and it cost 80% of what the entire system cost... 👎
Just another piece of junk