Water heater for home

[yardbird]

Ok this is going to maybe sound a bit .... odd... but here goes:

We will be moving to another house soon. I live in the northeastern US. It gets cold in the winter time. Anyways... in this next house the hot water heater is about 10 years old. It is a tank-type water heater. It keeps 40 gallons of water hot all the time. This is not for heating the house. It's just for hot water for bathing, laundry, doing dishes, etc. 
  I am considering getting a tankless water heater. (On-demand hot water) and I have heard that they are in widespread use all over Europe. It makes SENSE to me to only heat the water you are using, rather than wasting energy keeping a large tank of water hot all the time... just in case you might want some.

So... question #1 is:
Are tankless heaters widely used throughout Europe?

and question #2 would be if you HAVE a tankless heater:
Do you know the temperature of the water going INTO the tankless heater in wintertime?

See... the places that HAVE them will tell you that "this is all they use in Europe" and places that DON'T have them say, "Oh you don't want one of those. In the winter here you'll never have water that's hot because the supply water temperature is so low."

MY opinion is that Europeans make better use of energy and space than we Americans do and that they've been doing it for a long time. So since I know there are a lot of Euro-friends here... I hope to get some truth.

[G6Cad]

Dunno about the other parts of Europe, but in Sweden ( cold about 5 to 7 months a year ) they keep the watertanks but they change the things that heats the water up.
From oil to pellets ( small hardpressed wooden bits that looks like rabbit poo  )

Never really heard of what you describe there, but if you have a name on it, i can check some Swedish sites and see what they have to say about them  :up:

[Bluto]

OK, contractor talk...
Tankless water heaters are becoming more and more popular up here in the Northeast. And..they do work.
However, make absolutely sure that the guy installing it is certified,..yes he has to be certified for certain tankless systems.
A bad install will work like crap and make you long for your old system.
A good install however will save you energy and give you instant hot water. And it doesn't matter what the temp is coming in, the heater is set to heat it to a certain temperature for use in the house, about 120-140 degrees.
My plumber is trying to get me to put one in. My hot water is heated through the furnace by oil. Expensive.
But these things aint cheap, and neither is the installation.

[yardbird]

Bluto,

We have natural gas here so that would be what we use to power it. One thing I've learned is that you need a large size gas supply pipe or you'll starve the unit for gas and it will never work to full potential. I'm also learning about the cost of the unit plus installation and how that affects the return on investment. They also apparently require stainless steel vent due to the higher temps. Our current tank-type water heater vents into our chimney as does our boiler (hot water baseboard heat) so you have to make sure teh existing chimney can handle it. Lots to think about. I'm almost wondering if we wouldn't be better off just getting the best tank-type heater we can and letting it go at that. My wife has friends that have gone tankless and I've asked her to find out what kind they have, who installed it, etc. The up-front money to install it happens once.   If I can save enough every month then even if it takes 8 years to pay back the investment, at least I'll see the benefit in my utility bills every month as a reminder of why I spent the money.

[yardbird]

G6,

You heat your water with pellets?  Interesting. In the US our hot water tanks are usually about 150 to 190 liters. I think that would take a lot of pellets.    How many liters does your hot water tank hold?
Name of tankless heaters... hmmm.... manufacturers would be like Takagi, Rinnai, Bosch, and I know there are many others. Those 3 names appear to be teh most popular ones I think.

[Bluto]

Rinnai is about the most popular here in Jersey I believe. I'd have to talk to my plumber to get more specifics. But you are correct on the flow of gas needed, and the proper venting. The inspectors will look at that closely.
This initial investment will be costly, but you will have a smile on your face every month when you see what you're saving. I think 5 years is more a reasonable target for a return to show. Unless you need to do all that venting, instead of using the chimney.
Pellet stoves are also real big here, as well as outside wood heaters that push both hot air and hot water to your house, from an outside shed. But that's a bit of a pain to maintain.
Pelltes are sold out in every store here, and the price is getting high on those also.
A chord of wood has also doubled in the last year. Everyone is getting either wood or pellet stoves to save on gas and oil.
I live in the woods, so I can usually find some wood for free, for my wood stove in the basement. The heat comes right up the steps to heat the first floor fairly well. Just the labor of me cutting it up and splitting it. But it saves an enormous amount of oil, that the furnace would be using to heat the house.
Sounds like you've done your research and are close to deciding what to do. Good luck in whichever direction you go.
If you need more details about the training my plumber had to go through to get certified, let me know and I'll give him a call.
B-Lute

[ed_m2]

combination gas condensing boiler here.

does central heating & hot water on demand.

my guess is our incoming water temperature at worst is 6-7 deg c, but thats a guess.

works well for us as it would be rare for us to use a whole normal tank of hot water daily.

[G6Cad]

G6,

You heat your water with pellets?  Interesting. In the US our hot water tanks are usually about 150 to 190 liters. I think that would take a lot of pellets.    How many liters does your hot water tank hold?
Name of tankless heaters... hmmm.... manufacturers would be like Takagi, Rinnai, Bosch, and I know there are many others. Those 3 names appear to be teh most popular ones I think.

I live in a flat right now, but when i had a house we had a 450liter fresh water tank for shower, disches laundry etc 
Then we had a closed tank for the radiators that held 1500 liters of water and frost protection fluid.
We had oil first that heated everything, but removed the oil from the tank, built in some sort of chamber inside, and added an automated screw that portioned out the pellets from the old oiltank to the burner that the oil once feeded.

So more or less you replace the oil and use pellets instead.

The amount of pellets for a full winter, and to keep the water to 60 celcius and the temerature inside the house to 22 celsius were 4 qubic meter.
so a lot cheaper then oil and more friendly to the nature.