How Do You Install Ground Loop of Geothermal System?

Are you planning to buy DIY geothermal system? If so, then considering horizontal ground loop installation makes perfect sense. All you need to do is to hire a back hoe featuring a 36” bucket for a slinky loop. Or you can rent a chain trencher to deliver single line trenches for the ground loops.

When it comes to making the purchase of geothermal systems in the northern USA and in Canada, you will be provided with 800 feet coils per each loop by 123 Zero Energy. But in the southern climates, you will get 600 feet of piping.

However, you can consider vertical loops; but you will have to hire a drilling company for boring holes as required. Well loop or open loop is quite easy and very cost-effective alternative for you, if you want to go for DIY installation. Both of the loops can deliver the best performance in the long run.

Again if you reside on a lake, a lake loop may be good; but more number of municipalities are restricting the use of lake loops. It’s because of their potentially hazardous impact to the environment as they can develop a leak or a pipe crack. You can contact 123 Zero Energy to discuss about the options available for DIY geothermal system installation.

Understanding the Sizing of Geothermal System –

The size of a geothermal system is one loop for every ton. If you have any doubt, you can go for bigger size. The more contact the geothermal system lines have with the earth, the better the heat quality transfer will be.

A premier geothermal kit supplier, 123 Zero Energy uses larger diameter of piping like the 1” high density poly-ethylene piping. The use of larger diameter ensures more surface area of contact and better heat transfer.

Installing Ground Loops of a Geothermal System –

Start the installation process with mapping out your property by taking measurements of the trench distances. Please remember that, you will have to consider the additional supply and return piping you will need for the connection inside the house.

You should never splice a loop. If you need larger loops, you should contact 123 Zero Energy and they can supply you with 1000 ft piping roles.

In fact, you should contact your utility companies to know the places where the buried gas, water and gas lines are located. Once you’ve marked out the places, you need to hire a professional back hoe operator for digging your trenches effortlessly.

You have to maintain minimum distance of 6 feet to make sure you are below the frost line. In some of the northern areas, maintaining 8 feet ensures that you are below the frost line. After all, an experienced back hoe operator in your area must be familiar with the frost levels in your geographical area and will suggest you better options for your needs.

Once the digging of trenches is done, you need to align the bottom with 6” of sand before laying down your piping. This will help you optimal heat transfer and make sure that there are not air voids around the piping.

In addition to, the presence of sand will protect the piping from sharp rocks that may be found in the trench and could damage or punch the lines possibly. Once it’s done, you should start filling the trenches with 6”-12” of sand.

You will have to wet the sand to ensure that sand fills tightly around the poly-ethylene piping. At the end, you can fill the loops with clay and soil that you’d removed. Make sure that the ground is completely compacted to remove the air voids if there’s any.

Bottom Line –

Now you’ve understood how installing the ground loops of geothermal kit, should be done. If you want to learn more about geothermal systems, please contact 123 Zero Energy on +1 800 317 9054. We will get back to you as soon as possible!

Storage Options for Solar On Grid Systems

Solar on grid systems means the solar systems are tied to local utility grid. They are on high demand for good reasons. However, storage is important aspect of solar on grid systems. There are three different ways you can consider to store the solar energy you produce – DC batteries, hot water tanks and on grid or Net Metering. Please check out this post and understand better about storage options for solar on grid systems:

DC Batteries

Earlier, most solar consumers stored the solar energy in batteries and used this energy when required. This type of system is known as an off grid solar PV system and were popular amongst all consumers.

However, batteries are not the right solution and come with costs that add to the cost of an off grid solar system. They have a useful shelf life and if improperly managed, it can be as short as 2-3 year and have huge capital costs. In fact, these batteries need special designed charge controller in order to maintain and extend the battery life.

Most of the modern world is connected to the grid whereas off grid systems are used in the remote locations that don’t have access to grid power. This means, batteries are still popular for solar storage purposes. Now there’s a huge availability of lithium and salt water batteries with extensive lifecycle and reduced cost of ownership. Battery backup solar systems are perfect where the grid is prone to outages.

Hot Water

Earlier, hot water tanks were utilized as a dump zone for excessive PV production when the batteries were fully charged. But recently, Solar PV Hot Water has become its own use than just a dump zone and can deliver great returns on investment by heating hot water.

Solar thermal systems have been considered as the leader in this field; but the immense reduction on cost and introduction of CyboInverter has given some competition to solar thermal system. You can hook a solar array directly to a hot water heater and supply all your hot water requirements with very little cost and free storage. Even, it’s estimated that hot water heating consumes around 20-25% of the typical household energy. Solar PV water tanks may provide great system paybacks.

Net Metering

Instead of storing energy, you can lend the extra energy to other like lending your lawn mower to neighbor. Whenever you need it back, it will be right there for your use. Now there’s an availability of smart grids and most utility companies are capable of accepting anyone’s energy and have providing Net Metering or On Grid Solar PV Systems.

These systems don’t use any battery and rather utilize a DC inverter that converts the electricity to AC. Now the home can use this energy; but if it has surplus, the energy starts flowing from the outside the house to the grid. Please remember that, all of the 52 US states and all provinces throughout Canada have Net Metering options that are available to use for businesses and consumers.

Bottom Line –

Now you might have understood the storage options available for solar on grid systems. To know more about the solar on grid systems, please contact 123 Zero Energy at https://www.123zeroenergy.com/how-it-works/solar-pv-info.html.