Interesting but federal tax credits for heat pump water heaters is ending next month [1]. It looks nice though.
For people wondering what's up with the "150 gal virtual" capacity, it's actually a 47 gal water heater but it heats water to a really high temperature (if needed) and mixes it with a thermostatic valve to output the desired temperature. For example if cold water was 15 degrees C and you want the hot water to be 40 degrees C, it can triple its "capacity" by heating it up to 90 degrees C and then mixing one part hot water with 2 parts cold water to give you three times as much hot water. Of course, this comes with a grave penalty to efficiency so you should only do it for "party mode".
I was surprised at how cold "hot" water actually was. I thought it was 60-70, but apparently what feels "hot" is around 45-50. Especially for me, that finds anything beyond my shower's "middle" heat as uncomfortably hot, I must be showering with around 40 C water, which is basically "hot day" hot.
It's supposed to be HOT water, not lukewarm... I have my water heater set to 150F because it makes the hot water last longer, especially in the winter when the incoming supply is barely above freezing, but that doesn't make the tank bigger.
These data mining companies really take us for chumps.
Pay EXTRA for a water heater that collects data on when you shower, how much water you use, and at what temperature, so that they can sell that that to someone who wants to serve you a towel ad on your smart fridge screen after you get dressed.
Technology Connections have a video about how water heaters work in detail and how much power can be saved by strategically turning them off when not needed.
There's several layers of humor in TC videos, the cringe joke, the acknowledgement that "I'm making a cringe joke", the acknowledgement that the joke is still lame with the meta-joke, the "well I put it in the video anyway, aren't I funny?".
But the end result makes me cringe after all.
Edit: oh, you're talking about this product website...
One thing I learned from the video was how do water heaters get away with giving higher capacity numbers than they actually have. Well, apparently, kind of like air, hot water also rises and the heater keeps working while in use and it also has secondary heater element it can switch to, so it can follow the cold-hot water separation line.
The best investment in my comfort and upgrading my home was two redundantly configured Navien continuous water heaters.
Never worry about running out of hot water ever again. If I’m gone on a trip for 2 weeks my hot water bill is zero. Due to having overcapacity, whenever I have guests staying with me no one ever has to worry about simultaneously using showers or any other hot water at all. I run out of water pressure before I do heating capacity.
If one breaks I just schedule a repair or replacement for weeks in advance and have to limit folks to 2 simultaneous showers at any given time. Hasn’t happened yet.
I will never go back to a tank based water heater unless outright forced into it. It’s one of those “TiVo like” upgrades to your lifestyle you never knew you needed until you have it.
Certainly not cheap, but also not prohibitively expensive if you can find a competent installer who doesn’t overcharge.
Is this unusual in the US? I think almost everyone in the UK for years has been installing ‘combi’ boilers, which are ones that heat the water in radiators and also heat water on-demand.
A heat pump water heater seems like a no brainer way to improve efficiency.
They're not yet common, but there are many more options available over seas than in America.
This project seems emblematic of the challenges facing funding manufacturing initiatives in America.
What's funded are the projects that appeal to tech investors, more of a focus on flashy presentation, luxury design, AI, and cloud app features, than the baseline functionality.
We get innovation as a side effect of convincing investors that the idea will disrupt industries and create app ecosystems that lock in consumer attention.
Chasing the 100x unicorns and no longer training workhorses
Big problem in the US is that in many regions natural gas is cheaper than electricity, causing heat pump water heaters to be more expensive for the consumer. So everyone ends up burning more.
That doesn't make a lot of sense. A modern gas-fired plant is ~50% efficient and heat pumps typically have a COP of ~3 for hot water, so if you take natural gas, burn it to convert it to electricity, then feed that electricity to a heat pump, you'll get ~1.5x the energy you'd get if you just burned the natural gas.
How does the electricity get from the generating unit to the heat pump? What are the environmental conditions during heat pump operation?
These things sound so obvious when you don't factor in the annoying little details like transmission of energy. System complexity also matters. There's this thing called "total cost of ownership" that paints a more honest picture regarding how these economics interact.
Using heat pumps to solve a problem looks fantastic in operational efficiency terms, but what happens if the control board breaks and the vendor decided to move on? Dumb, slightly less efficient appliances might actually be cheaper and better for the environment in total. If I have to create a pile of e-waste every 3 years just to save 10% on my energy bill for something that is already incredibly cheap in absolute terms, I think it could be argued I've made everything worse.
Maybe the problem is shared deeper than that, that both industry and individuals are not interested, incentivized, or capable of investing into improving on good enough.
The pricing page does not make it clear how much the actual unit costs, just $6500 with installation. Never purchased a water heater, but going to Home Depot, I see traditional options priced $500-$2000.
Which says you are putting up a high upfront cost, hoping to recoup on increased efficiency. Which could be worthwhile, but you would have to run some simulations if the price is worthwhile. Seems potentially easier to get a dumb water heater to run extra hot using off-peak electricity.
Color me skeptical but the lack of mention about data privacy on that website screams this to me:
Pay EXTRA for an over engineered water heater whose company sells your data about how much water you use, when you use it, and at what temperature, so that costco or someone can serve you a towel ad on your smart fridge screen after you get dressed or do the dishes.
Where does it day that? Would be great if it chose inside or outside based on target inside temp (e.g. cools indoor air in summer to heat water for washing and showers)
Looking at pictures it must pull heat from ambient air or from electricity. There is not enough tubes to have interior and external heat exchanging units.
$6.5k for a water heater? Does it make coffee and give back massages?But seriously, is it going to recoup the extra 4.5$ in 10 years or so or however often people replace water heaters.
And hopefully the smart part is not relying on external connections or services. Otherwise next time the cloud service goes down you end up taking cold showers, both figuratively and literally.
Pretty cool. Reminds me of Impulse. I think there's a big market for home appliances that have more care and attention to detail than we're accustomed to. No one I know is overly satisfied with their water heater.
... I may be out of touch with US water usage, but just how much hot water does the average household use?
They quote $2,500 10-year savings vs oil. I have my hot water piggybacked on the oil-fired condensing boiler unit that's also used for my central heating, and I doubt I burn more than $250/year total on the hot water side of the equation (in a 4-bed, 4-bath house).
Interesting but federal tax credits for heat pump water heaters is ending next month [1]. It looks nice though.
For people wondering what's up with the "150 gal virtual" capacity, it's actually a 47 gal water heater but it heats water to a really high temperature (if needed) and mixes it with a thermostatic valve to output the desired temperature. For example if cold water was 15 degrees C and you want the hot water to be 40 degrees C, it can triple its "capacity" by heating it up to 90 degrees C and then mixing one part hot water with 2 parts cold water to give you three times as much hot water. Of course, this comes with a grave penalty to efficiency so you should only do it for "party mode".
[1] https://www.energystar.gov/about/federal-tax-credits
Yeah this sounds disingenuous. I can also see my heater to 70C if I want, that does not increase its size...
It is a scalding hazard though. At 70°C skin burns occur in about a second or so.
The thermostatic valve makes it so that the water that comes out of the water heater is at a more reasonable temperature.
I was surprised at how cold "hot" water actually was. I thought it was 60-70, but apparently what feels "hot" is around 45-50. Especially for me, that finds anything beyond my shower's "middle" heat as uncomfortably hot, I must be showering with around 40 C water, which is basically "hot day" hot.
It's supposed to be HOT water, not lukewarm... I have my water heater set to 150F because it makes the hot water last longer, especially in the winter when the incoming supply is barely above freezing, but that doesn't make the tank bigger.
I think what this "smart tank" does is mix the super-hot with cold.
If the automatic mixing feature malfunctions to super-hot, then it could be risky...
I don't think hot water should be this smart.
The last "intelligent" systems that made sense to me in the home are variable speed HVAC and micro grid / solar / battery stuff.
What is the value add to the customer of making hot water an app that can presumably stop working the next time AWS goes down?
These data mining companies really take us for chumps.
Pay EXTRA for a water heater that collects data on when you shower, how much water you use, and at what temperature, so that they can sell that that to someone who wants to serve you a towel ad on your smart fridge screen after you get dressed.
Technology Connections have a video about how water heaters work in detail and how much power can be saved by strategically turning them off when not needed.
https://youtu.be/Bm7L-2J52GU
However, the website has some weird vibes as well, like why would you say something like below?
> And some just want Dad Mode for when your teenager needs to finish that shower.
There's several layers of humor in TC videos, the cringe joke, the acknowledgement that "I'm making a cringe joke", the acknowledgement that the joke is still lame with the meta-joke, the "well I put it in the video anyway, aren't I funny?".
But the end result makes me cringe after all.
Edit: oh, you're talking about this product website...
Yeah, that was a sneaky one on my part.
One thing I learned from the video was how do water heaters get away with giving higher capacity numbers than they actually have. Well, apparently, kind of like air, hot water also rises and the heater keeps working while in use and it also has secondary heater element it can switch to, so it can follow the cold-hot water separation line.
The best investment in my comfort and upgrading my home was two redundantly configured Navien continuous water heaters.
Never worry about running out of hot water ever again. If I’m gone on a trip for 2 weeks my hot water bill is zero. Due to having overcapacity, whenever I have guests staying with me no one ever has to worry about simultaneously using showers or any other hot water at all. I run out of water pressure before I do heating capacity.
If one breaks I just schedule a repair or replacement for weeks in advance and have to limit folks to 2 simultaneous showers at any given time. Hasn’t happened yet.
I will never go back to a tank based water heater unless outright forced into it. It’s one of those “TiVo like” upgrades to your lifestyle you never knew you needed until you have it.
Certainly not cheap, but also not prohibitively expensive if you can find a competent installer who doesn’t overcharge.
Is this unusual in the US? I think almost everyone in the UK for years has been installing ‘combi’ boilers, which are ones that heat the water in radiators and also heat water on-demand.
The price is ridiculous. You can buy a premium heat pump water heater for ~$2000 and instantly save $4500.
A heat pump water heater seems like a no brainer way to improve efficiency. They're not yet common, but there are many more options available over seas than in America.
This project seems emblematic of the challenges facing funding manufacturing initiatives in America. What's funded are the projects that appeal to tech investors, more of a focus on flashy presentation, luxury design, AI, and cloud app features, than the baseline functionality.
We get innovation as a side effect of convincing investors that the idea will disrupt industries and create app ecosystems that lock in consumer attention. Chasing the 100x unicorns and no longer training workhorses
Big problem in the US is that in many regions natural gas is cheaper than electricity, causing heat pump water heaters to be more expensive for the consumer. So everyone ends up burning more.
That doesn't make a lot of sense. A modern gas-fired plant is ~50% efficient and heat pumps typically have a COP of ~3 for hot water, so if you take natural gas, burn it to convert it to electricity, then feed that electricity to a heat pump, you'll get ~1.5x the energy you'd get if you just burned the natural gas.
How does the electricity get from the generating unit to the heat pump? What are the environmental conditions during heat pump operation?
These things sound so obvious when you don't factor in the annoying little details like transmission of energy. System complexity also matters. There's this thing called "total cost of ownership" that paints a more honest picture regarding how these economics interact.
Using heat pumps to solve a problem looks fantastic in operational efficiency terms, but what happens if the control board breaks and the vendor decided to move on? Dumb, slightly less efficient appliances might actually be cheaper and better for the environment in total. If I have to create a pile of e-waste every 3 years just to save 10% on my energy bill for something that is already incredibly cheap in absolute terms, I think it could be argued I've made everything worse.
Maybe the problem is shared deeper than that, that both industry and individuals are not interested, incentivized, or capable of investing into improving on good enough.
What about heat pump and solar. Maybe just a financing issue then? Maybe installation issue for appartments and rentals.
The pricing page does not make it clear how much the actual unit costs, just $6500 with installation. Never purchased a water heater, but going to Home Depot, I see traditional options priced $500-$2000.
Which says you are putting up a high upfront cost, hoping to recoup on increased efficiency. Which could be worthwhile, but you would have to run some simulations if the price is worthwhile. Seems potentially easier to get a dumb water heater to run extra hot using off-peak electricity.
Color me skeptical but the lack of mention about data privacy on that website screams this to me:
Pay EXTRA for an over engineered water heater whose company sells your data about how much water you use, when you use it, and at what temperature, so that costco or someone can serve you a towel ad on your smart fridge screen after you get dressed or do the dishes.
The heat pump will pull heat from inside the house? This sounds terrible for efficiency in winter, as you will need to reheat the room
Where does it day that? Would be great if it chose inside or outside based on target inside temp (e.g. cools indoor air in summer to heat water for washing and showers)
Looking at pictures it must pull heat from ambient air or from electricity. There is not enough tubes to have interior and external heat exchanging units.
$6.5k for a water heater? Does it make coffee and give back massages?But seriously, is it going to recoup the extra 4.5$ in 10 years or so or however often people replace water heaters.
And hopefully the smart part is not relying on external connections or services. Otherwise next time the cloud service goes down you end up taking cold showers, both figuratively and literally.
Pretty cool. Reminds me of Impulse. I think there's a big market for home appliances that have more care and attention to detail than we're accustomed to. No one I know is overly satisfied with their water heater.
... I may be out of touch with US water usage, but just how much hot water does the average household use?
They quote $2,500 10-year savings vs oil. I have my hot water piggybacked on the oil-fired condensing boiler unit that's also used for my central heating, and I doubt I burn more than $250/year total on the hot water side of the equation (in a 4-bed, 4-bath house).
Not interested until it can also show ads.