Pool Heating

[Iris 2]

Hi Everyone

Hope you are all keeping well during these tough/strange times.

Does anyone have any experience of pool heating installation and costs?

We have been given a quote by the firm that look after our pool but any recommendations plus an idea of costs would be great.

The quote we have is for a 16kw system including a thermal cover and roller.

Cheers

Darrell

[PolemIan]

It’s been covered on her a while ago. My opinion, for what it’s worth, is that a solar cover, google geobubble, is a more cost effective solution. We bought ours in the U.K. and shipped it over when we moved, but Shipshape for one now stock them. Using that means we start using the pool in early April and end around 6 or 7 November, this year could have been a bit later. The added advantage during the periods it’s on is that you’ll save chlorine being burnt off by the sun and evaporation will be massively reduced, so will save you a bit of water. I think you also get to the point where the pool may be warm but would you want mto be outside anyway, especially if there’s a cool winter breeze.

Hope this helps

Ian

[cyprusmax47]

Green Air Paphos, one of the main sponsors on PL, have all kind of pool heating systems in stock. For an e-mail request, the size of the pool is important in order to find the correct size of the necessary heat exchanger. ([email protected])

Max

[Anarita John]

A thermal cover is a must for any pool heating system. Ours allowed us to swim till the second week of November without heating the pool. After the 12th November, we began using our pool heater. It is an inverter heat pump system, installed by Greenair and uses very little electricity. Each hour it is on raises the temperature by about 1c. With our solar panels, we are using the surplus units of electricity which we have produced over the year to heat our pool. I have estimated that we can use 27kw per day of surplus energy until March, when EAC takes away our surplus units.
On a cold night, our pool loses around 3c,(last night only 1c) but without a cover the loss would be much more. Today the pool was 20c when I put the heater on at 9:30am. By 2:00pm it was nearly 25c so perfectly swimmable. We used 9kw from our reserve of electricity and 29 units in total during the 24hour period which included air con heating, cooking etc as well as the pool.

Our system uses a lot less than 5kw per hour. Consumption varies according to the air temperature. With a 16kw per hour burn our excess units would soon disappear. If we were paying the standard grid rate, it would be too expensive to run.

[Iris 2]

Thanks Everyone - really useful.

Sounds like GreenAir may be a good option.

AJ - I'll drop you a quick DM if thats OK?

[Jim B]

John
What size is the air pump you have for your pool please.

Jim

[PolemIan]

A thermal cover is a must for any pool heating system. Ours allowed us to swim till the second week of November without heating the pool. After the 12th November, we began using our pool heater. It is an inverter heat pump system, installed by Greenair and uses very little electricity. Each hour it is on raises the temperature by about 1c. With our solar panels, we are using the surplus units of electricity which we have produced over the year to heat our pool. I have estimated that we can use 27kw per day of surplus energy until March, when EAC takes away our surplus units.
On a cold night, our pool loses around 3c,(last night only 1c) but without a cover the loss would be much more. Today the pool was 20c when I put the heater on at 9:30am. By 2:00pm it was nearly 25c so perfectly swimmable. We used 9kw from our reserve of electricity and 29 units in total during the 24hour period which included air con heating, cooking etc as well as the pool.

Our system uses a lot less than 5kw per hour. Consumption varies according to the air temperature. With a 16kw per hour burn our excess units would soon disappear. If we were paying the standard grid rate, it would be too expensive to run.

Thanks for that John I’ve often wondered how much energy these system use and what the gains are. Don’t forget though that EAC have have now changed the billing systems for us net metering users so that target being ‘free’ when in credit, we effectively receive a discount in the units we use when we are drawing in more power than the panels are producing. Still much, much cheaper of course.

[Anarita John]

It is a Fairland Invertor. The booklet gives different specifications. I think the heating capacity is around 18kw but, because it is an air pump, it uses far less. We have kept our pool at 24c and 25c all this week and used approximately 22 units of electricity each day. It is smaller than the unit Greenair have on display in their offices. One day I did track the electricity that went through our meter and it was 10kw for 5 hours, the rest being solar energy we were producing.

Looked at the model number this morning. Fairland 1xR66. According to the info on the plate it produces 22kw. However, input varies due to atmospheric conditions. Ours is a standard 8x4 pool.

[Anarita John]

Just to show how little electric our pool heater uses. Set at 29c. Had already been running for one hour. Used 3.6 units through the meter. Increased the pool temp by 0.8c. Pool 24c. Outputting water at 26c. It is a cloudy day so we will be using only a small amount of solar energy. Also our pump is huge, 1.6kw which we are thinking of replacing for a smaller one or even a solar pump.

[cyprusmax47]

Also our pump is huge, 1.6kw which we are thinking of replacing for a smaller one or even a solar pump.

The advantage of the solar pool pump is that it circulates the water the whole day, even without sunshine, which avoids not only any electricity consumption but also reduces chemicals and maintenance time.

Max

[Paul]

If you are using a pool heater make sure you draw water from the very bottom of the pool.
If not you can end up with a warm water layer at the top of the pool and when you get in you will feel cold water lower down.