Solar In Seattle

Solar H20 Heater (Looks like a skylight!)

It may be hard to believe, but yes, solar power can and does work in Seattle! To quote Puget Sound Solar, a local solar installation in Seattle: “This is not your grandfather’s solar panel.”Truer words couldn’t be spoken.

No surprise then, that on the week of October 27, 2008, Puget Sound Solar installed a 20-tube Thermomax  solar collector,  along 80-gallon SuperStor Ultra stainless storage tank w/ heat exchanger, electric element, Oventrop solar pump station, SunEarth controller, automatic heat dump and a ll the accouterments.

And the system so rocks!

The All-In_One Solar/Electric H2O Tank

Even on a cloudy day, light pours into the glass tube collectors, creating enough heat to warm the copper filaments that heat the closed-system propylene-glycol  solution (think of “greenhouse” in a good sense here!”) This closed-tube system runs down to the tank, where it exchanges the water in the tank (the heat, not the glycol solution)

The preheated water then sits in the double-lined stainless steel tank (a tank within a tank- *lots* of insulation, folks!) and when called upon, the hot water is then brought up to heating par (110 F) by the electric backup element.

In summer, the electric element won’t be needed, as the heat will be hot enough on the roof. In winter, like today when it is 28 degrees out, the electric element is doing most of the heating.

SuperStor!

My neighbors say they just laughed when the snow hit the solar collector… and yes, it must look funny today, when we’ve had a foot of snow and the outdoor temp is 28 (solar collector is 36, but the temp at the bottom of the heating element is 68, at this time-midnight- on  a snowy day! Meaning the electric element only had to work to bring the H20 up 32 degrees.)

However, I’ll be laughing all the way to the bank during the other 11 months of the year, with my reduced heating bill… and not to mention a hefty $2500 tax credit on my 2008 income tax!

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The total price for the above work was $10,086. Less the $2500 tax credit, that brings it to $7586.00.The installation includes a 10-year limited warranty of Thermomax collector, a limited lifetime warranty on the storage tank. See www.pugetsoundsolar.com for more info on this and other awesome systems! Lots and lots of photo coverage of the companies solar projects!