Electric or Gas for pool heater

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sgarofalo

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LifeTime Supporter
Apr 6, 2015
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Mount Pleasant/Wi
Hi everyone, wanted to get some thoughts from people who have heaters for the pool.

Did some searching on the forum and from what I've read Raypak is getting the most reccomendations from most of you on here.

I went to their site and found the pool sizer calculation page to estimate what type of heater I would need.

http://roxwebdev01.pixelgate.net/gas_sizing/Raypak.php?appid=1

On that page given my input.

Heating the pool May through October to a temp of 82 degrees.

Milwaukee Wisconsin area

Solar Cover on 20hrs per day.

Its calculating that I would consume about $266 in electric costs. $461 in natural gas, and some un-godly amount using propane.

I was planning on Gas or Electric but never having a pool heater before thought I would ask for some advice before digging any further.
 
I had thought about going the solar panel route in combination with the solar cover.

My wife and I were talking last night about a friend of mine who has a similar pool with a heater. Keeps his about 85 throughout the wisconsin swim season (Mayish through early October) no cover at all for him and he is defintely PoolStore oriented. Trying to convert him but we shall see how that goes.

Anyway, my wife was saying how she wants WARM water in the pool, given our climate and potential for actual solar temp increases I wanted to atleast investigate the actual heater as an option too.
 
I have a Hayward 250,000 BTU gas heater. My gas bill has not seen that much of a spike actually. So at this point I am still very happy with it. A heat pump will save you a little money on your utility bill however it takes longer to heat up the pool. That link appears to be for a Heat Pump. I'm sure the experts will chime in.
 
Electric heat pumps are best when you are maintaining temperature all the time, the air temperature is reasonably high, and your electric rates are not wildly high (as they are some places). They lose efficiency rapidly as the air temperature goes down.

Gas heat is best for "event" heat, for example that one nice weekend in the spring. Gas heats a lot more quickly, and we are usually talking days, not hours.

Most people discover that they don't use the heat all the time because even electric heat pumps can get wildly expensive. So gas is best for most people.
 
For fast heating, gas is the answer. Seeing the OP is in WI and his wife likes a WARM pool, she would happiest with gas. It can be as warm as she likes and when she likes.
 
sgarofalo said:
wisconsin swim season (Mayish through early October) no cover at all
Click to expand...

I had the impression that Georgia was warmer than Wisconsin. I'd consider my pool season to be from Mayish through September.

We had a heat pump since we got the pool and I just switched to gas. It just took too long to heat it up with the heat pump, talking days...
 
One therm of Natural gas produces 100,000BTU of heat. I believe a pool heater is around 80% efficiency. Therefore a natural gas unit of 100K will give 80,000BTU per hour at a cost of .80 cents per therm. (Check cost per therm in your area.
A heat pump to produce the same BTU is this. Electric produces 3414 BTU per hour of heat. The average heat pump in 70 degree weather is about 4-6 COP. (Efficient) Which means for every unit of electricity you put into it you get 4-6 units back in energy, or heat. Therefore lets use the average of 5 COP. 3414 times 5 COP = 17,070 BTU of heat. The unit of electricity you used for that is called a kilowatt. A kilowatt in my area costs .08 cents.
Cost comparison is as follows. I have to buy 4.68 kilowatt to produce 80,000 BTU in a heat pump. (80,000 / 17,070 = 4.68 KWH) .08 cents x 4.68 =.37 cents.
Ending result is, the heat pump will cost 50% of the cost of a NG heater, IF your gas cost is >80 cents per therm and .08 cents per KWH.
 
I just installed a gas heater (266k BTU for 17,500 gallon pool).
I've only been running it for four days now, so I'm not sure what the cost is for heating.
It took 22 hours to bring my water from 60 degrees to 84. I run it a few hours every morning to get it back to 84 at 1 PM so I can swim. I am loving it!

No way would I be swimming yet if it was a heat pump.

Boise Idaho...temps have been 65-71 this week with night time temps dropping to 50-ish.

I know I'll be in shock when I get my first gas bill, but for now, I'm just enjoying it!
 

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I get a 1 to 2 degree per hour warm-up rate with my gas heater, like Jason said if you want a warm pool for an event you can have it up to temp in a day. My wallet cringes when I hear the heater fire up though.
 
Awilli8203 said:
I live in Pittsburgh and have an electric heat exchanger. They do not work very well in spring and fall when you need heat the most. I am going to switch to a gas heater.
Click to expand...
Did you make the switch? I’m having an 18x36 installed now and bought an Aquacat115 which is 112btu’s.
I know it will do the same as a larger btu unit to MAINTAIN the temp we want (mid-high 80’s), however from what I read on here it may not do that April/May and October.
 
Correct. HPs need the weather to cooperate. On warm years they extend the season nicely. On average years they work well enough but not as deep in the season as a gas heater would. On cold years they don't perform and you knew going in it wouldn't be perfect.


Basically, HPs are for the regular season, heating a warm pool when it's already warm out. Gas heaters are for extending the season. Everybody wants both but most have to pick 1. If they go gas, it's expensive during the regular season. If they go HP, the season isn't as long.
 
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