Information on Heaters - Electric vs Gas

[lardo5150]

So, when building our pool, we figured we would save money and not get a heater. Thought we would never use it when it was cold outside....
Well, my kids have changed that. They have been wanting to swim this month, and the water has been freezing.
So we are now thinking of adding a heater.

I have a 16K gallon pool, salt. its only about 3.5 years old.
I called our pool builder, looking to get a bid. Price is about what I expected, also the time frame (Texas apparently has zero pool equipment right now from that Mr. Freeze Storm).

I was quoted on Electric and Gas.
The Gas may cost more than they quoted, because the pool equipment is on the back right of the house. My gas meter, is on the front left. They mentioned they MIGHT be able to go through the attic, but if they can't I assume it is going to be a mess to get a line over there.

What about electric? Will Electric heat my pool up just as fast as Gas? What is a realistic temp rise for electric vs gas?
They were quoting me for the 400BTU unit in gas.
I guess I am going to take a hit in utilities either way, so my focus is on what can heat up the pool faster, and the running of a gas line.

Anyone with experience with the electrics?

 

[ajw22]

A 120K BTU heat pump will heat your pool about 0.8 - 0.9 degrees an hour.

A 400K gas heater will heat your 16,000 gallon pool about 3X as fast around 2.5 degrees an hour.

Pentair has a Heat Pump Calculator to determine the appropriate size Heat Pump for your location. Pentair seems to do honest calculations based on the physics and efficiencies of each type of pump and energy source.

Raypak also has a Heat Pump Heater Sizing App.

To get the most accurate cost comparison you should change the default electric kwh, natural gas price, and propane price to actual prices in your area.

This Heating Runtime and Cost spreadsheet contains:

• A Scratch Pad where you can estimate the hours needed to run the heater to achieve a desired temperature rise for a given water volume. There is a Multiplier Factor to account for variability in heating water that is subject to the elements. This is explained further in the spreadsheet.
• A Cost Estimator where you can select the billing unit from a drop-down list, cost per billing unit, heater BTU, and number of hours the heater is run. For the number of hours, you can use either the hours calculated in the Scratch Pad or enter your own figure. The spreadsheet calculates cost by taking the cost per billing unit and dividing it by the number of BTUs in that billing unit to arrive at a cost per BTU. It then takes the cost per BTU and multiplies that by the Gross BTU output of the heater to get the cost per hour to run the heater. The cost per hour is then multiplied by the number of hours the heater is run to arrive at the Total cost to run the heater for X hours.

The spreadsheet is set up to use with Natural Gas heaters. It estimates the variable usage-based cost that appears on your bill. Fixed costs that appear on your bill are not factored into cost calculations since, by definition, a fixed cost is static and would appear on your bill as the same amount each month regardless of consumption.

When using the runtime for Heat Pumps put the Heat Pump BTU's in the Net heater BTU field instead of reducing it by 20% for natural gas heater efficiency loss.

This spreadsheet loads in Excel .xls 2003 format but should be saved in .xlsx format.

 

[mknauss]

Regardless how you heat the pool water, you must use a cover to retain the heat.