OSLO: Better architecture and energy savings in buildings could do more to fight global warming than all curbs on greenhouse gases agreed under the UN’s Kyoto Protocol, a UN study showed on Thursday.
Better use of concrete, metals and timber in construction and less use of energy for everything from air conditioners to lighting in [...]
Federal appliance standards require that all water heaters achieve a certain rating on a standardized scale. The rating for water heaters is called the Efficiency Factor (EF), based on the use of 64 gallons per day under standard test conditions. The federal appliance standards require the following EFs for electric water heaters:
Size……………………… Efficiency Factor (EF)
30 [...]
Air conditioning is one of those amenities that’s easy to take for granted if you have it, and-on a hot, humid summer afternoon-easy to covet if you don’t. In fact, in relatively warm climates, central air conditioners have become more the norm than the exception. In addition to cooling, they dehumidify and filter air, making [...]
It has been pointed out that radiant-floor heating systems may not be the best choice for extremely well-insulated, passive solar homes. So when do they make sense?
• In houses and small commercial buildings with conventional levels of insulation and standard insulated-glass windows—especially those in climates with minimal cooling loads—where the extra comfort of radiant [...]
Radiant-floor heating offers a number of significant benefits:
Comfort. By far, the biggest selling point for radiant-floor heating is comfort. The large radiant surface means that most of the heat will be delivered by radiation—heating occupants directly—rather than by convection (the primary mechanism of heat delivery from conventional hydronic baseboard “radiatorsâ€). Warmer surfaces in a living [...]
Refrigeration units, commonly known as air conditioners, are mechanical systems that remove heat and moisture from the air by passing it over a cold surface. When warm, moist “inside” air is blown across the surface of the unit’s cooling coil, the air temperature drops and the water vapor in it condenses making the air cooler [...]
The rate of heat transfer from your house to the outside, or vice versa, is dependent partly on the temperature difference between your house and outside. More heat is transferred when the difference is greater, so it takes more energy to keep your house at 72°F when it is 40°F outside than to heat your [...]
Air-to-air heat pumps are basically air conditioners with the capability of reversing their cycle to provide heating in the wintertime. During the summer, air conditioners remove heat from your house, and shunt it outside. Air source heat pumps have a switching system that allows them to operate in reverse in the winter, removing heat from [...]
A decision about whether to reinstall a heat pump depends on what is causing the poor performance of your current heat pump. It could be because the heat pump is really not meeting your heating needs, or because you have expectations based on previous experience with other types of furnaces.
There can be several causes of [...]
With rising energy prices and a cold winter underway, it’s tempting to think about using portable room heaters.If your central heat is electric, you’ll almost certainly save money by using portable electric heaters. In fact, part of the savings come because valuable heat isn’t being lost in the ducts before it reaches your living area.
If [...]
Common mistakes we make include:
1. Letting the furnace or air conditioner salesperson sell them a unit that’s much bigger than they need.
2. Not getting the ducts checked for leakage when installing a new heating and cooling system.
3. Thinking that “since heat rises, we [...]
There are a number of factors that cause differences in energy bills, so comparing your bill to someone else’s is like comparing apples to oranges. The ages of major appliances, especially refrigerators and air conditioners, can make a dramatic difference in your bill. In addition, if your house leaks air like a sieve while your [...]
Whether you should insulate or replace your furnace first depends on the situation in your house. Factors that influence this decision are the age and efficiency of your furnace, and the amount of insulation currently present in the house.
In general it is more cost-effective to upgrade insulation than it is to upgrade your furnace. However, [...]
What is an ERV?
One of the main advantages of a well-insulated and well-sealed building envelope is that it takes less energy to heat and cool the home. An efficient building envelope keeps the conditioned air within the home that needs a smaller furnace and/or air-conditioner that is working less often — and this translates into [...]
The difference between HRV heat recovery ventilation and ERV energy recovery ventilation is the humidity. In a plate heat exchanger, the air flows are separated by metal plates. Humidity can not be exchanged.
Rotating heat exchanger with many small flues
The rotating heat exchanger is made by a material able to absorb humidity. In the rotating part [...]
A heat exchanger is a device built for efficient heat transfer from one fluid to another, whether the fluids are separated by a solid wall so that they never mix, or the fluids are directly contacted. They are widely used in petroleum refineries, chemical plants, petrochemical plants, natural gas processing, refrigeration, power plants, air conditioning [...]
Heat recovery ventilation (also known as a heat exchanger, air exchanger or air-to-air exchanger) is a ventilation system that employs a counter-flow heat exchanger between the inbound and outbound air flow. HRV provide fresh air and improved climate control, while also saving energy by reducing the heating (or cooling) requirements.
Heat recovery ventilators (HRV’s), as the [...]
Air purifier, commonly referred to as air cleaner, are electronic devices. The goal of these electronic devices is to clean the air. This is done by eliminating harmful air contaminants. Air contaminant is another word that is used to describe air particles. No matter what they are called, they could be harmful to your [...]
Leakage is the main source of draining energy and consequently loosing dollars.So our fundamental function to save energy is to find and seal it.
While a blower door test is the best way to locate duct leaks, you can often locate supply duct leaks with your hand because supply leaks blow air out. However, [...]
All Solar Ventilator units provide ventilation, supplementary heating and a powerful dehumidifying effect, but how efficient are they as an additional heat source for your house?
The answer is that they are surprisingly efficient; the output from the larger SolarVentilation units provide a substantial amount of free energy in the form of warmed [...]
ETS hydronic systems have the ability to store electricity as heat during off-peak hours and use this stored heat to heat water for radiant hydronic heating installations. Delivery of heated water from the ETS system is very similar to conventional hot water or boiler systems. Hot water can be circulated through tubing located in the [...]
Heat pump systems are known as one of the most efficient methods of heating and cooling. Using an ETS unit to provide the supplemental heat needed with a heat pump at low outdoor temperatures instead of the more commonly used direct electric strip heat allows the heat pump’s high efficiency to be combined with the [...]
Electric Thermal Storage (ETS) is a heat storage technology that can reduce home heating costs where time-of-use (TOU) or low, off-peak rates are offered. Where such rates are available, electricity is most expensive during the day-time hours when the demand for power is the highest. ETS shifts the home’s heating load from the higher-cost, on-peak [...]
Electric resistance heating is generally considered to be 100% efficient. That’s because almost all of the electricity put into a resistance heater comes out as heat.
The misconception that sometimes traps and confuses people is thinking that this is the entire story, and forgetting that making the electricity and getting it to the heater was not [...]
The cooling efficiency measurement for heat pumps is the Energy Efficiency Ratio or EER. This is the same rating system used for air conditioners.
EER is the number of BTUs of cooling provided per watt of electrical energy consumed. The energy includes electricity used for indoor and outdoor fans and the compressor.
EER =Cooling [...]
Electric resistance heat works by directly converting electric current into heat. Virtually all of the energy in the electricity ends up as usable heat, but this system is still pretty inefficient when you consider the inefficiency of electric generation and additional losses during transmission.
Electric resistance heat is usually the most expensive form of heat [...]
Using the sun’s light instead of electricity to light a space is known as daylighting. Because it is free, using it makes sense when possible. Of course, it’s only available during the day, and if you are air conditioning your home, it may cost more to let the sun’s heat in since your air [...]
Electricity can be used for heating in two ways:
Resistance Heaters
Heat Pumps
[...]
Electric furnaces come in a variety of configurations and are similar to the more common gas-forced air furnaces. Most electric furnaces are multi-flow units (meaning that the same unit can be positioned in a variety of ways: upflow, downflow, or horizontal).
Compared to electric baseboard heating systems, forced-air electric furnaces provide the advantage of a centralized [...]
Heat pump water heaters operate on the same principle as space conditioning heat pumps, moving rather than creating heat. Powered by electricity and using the same refrigeration process used by your air conditioner or refrigerator, they remove heat from the surrounding air and reject it into the water in a storage tank. Because they are [...]