Solar electric pool heater?

[justinm001]

I have a 20k gallon pool and looking to keep it warmer during the summer and hopefully get a few more days.

Picked up an electric 24kw heater but needs 4ga 240 wiring. I'm wondering if there might be a better heater type to just run solar panels to an electric heater inline?

I don't want to run water thru one of those solar heaters because I'm not there often and don't trust it not to leak.

Can't I just find some heating element and size it to the max watts then plug directly to the solar panels? Put some disconnect relay on a temp sensor/flow sensor.

 

[Vigo]

With that amount of water to heat it would take an absurd amount of solar panels to amount to much. There may be lower hanging fruit. For example, is there any shade on the pool that can be reduced? Do you use a pool cover during the off season, and if so what color? Just thinking..

 

[justinm001]

I have a solar cover but my house is so tall that it shades half the pool. My calculations show it'll take 50kw to raise 1 degree in temp. So 5kw solar would barely help and even then it's wasted half the year when the pool isn't running.

Guess I'll go back to installing the electric one and adding solar to offset the electric costs

 

[xjaw4]

Do you run an air conditioner at home?

Why pay $ to move heat from inside your home to outside where it is already hot? A heat exchanger on your AC unit(s) can move that heat to your pool. Make your AC cost less to run and your pool warmer at the same time.

How to Heat a Swimming Pool with an Air Conditioner

Did you know that you can heat your pool with help from your home's central AC system? With guidance from a plumbing and heating expert, this guide shows you how.

www.homedepot.com

Or alternatively there are air to water heat pumps specifically designed to heat (or cool) your pool by moving the heat to/from the air as required.

Summit XL | Hayward Residential and Commercial Pool Products

Designed exclusively for the trade, Summit XL heat pumps are the latest addition to the Hayward Expert Line of product. They reliably provide an efficient, comfortable, relaxing pool environment and the ultimate in quiet backyard performance.

www.hayward-pool.com

Hayward Above-Ground Heat Pump | Heaters | Above Ground Pool Heaters - Hayward Pool Products

These economical heat pumps are right-sized for smaller swimming pools up to 13,000 gallons. As with all Hayward heat pumps, it is energy efficient and designed to provide years of pool comfort.

www.hayward-pool.com

Some of these have a COP of 6. Meaning you'd get 6X the heat into the pool for the same electrical input compared to a resistance heater.

The pool cover can help reduce evaporation. Each pound of water that evaporates absorbs 970 BTU 8089 BTU per gallon Even a small drop in depth can be many gallons worth of water lost per day. Even it isn't increasing your gains a pool cover is reducing your losses in terms of water and heat.

 

[justinm001]

I saw that using a heat exchanger on AC and thinking about that especially as I want to move one of the AC units off my deck so I have more space. Maybe I can put the AC unit on the roof next to the pool and use this. It runs quite a bit and since I want it moved it'll need recharged anyways. I'll still need to setup the electric pool heater to get more days as even if the AC heat exchanger works it won't help much for spring/fall

I know a pool heat pump would be ideal but I'm not at the property much and the whole space is finished so the heat pump would need to be pretty far from the pool and I'm mostly concerned about leaks or something cracking in the winter and dealing with issues. An electric heater or even the AC heat exchanger uses thin lines and I can run along the wall to the roof of the deck or something. I have a huge muti-speed pump so it uses minimal flow/noise during the day but 3HP huge flow at night.

 

[Skypower]

Swimming pool heat pump. I only found out that there was such a thing a few months back, but I must’ve been living under a rock because a lot of people here knew about them.

 

[justinm001]

Swimming pool heat pump. I only found out that there was such a thing a few months back, but I must’ve been living under a rock because a lot of people here knew about them.

Yupp. Problem is they're large and loud like a house heat pump. I considered these a while back but have to put it 20ft+ away from the pool pump and add a concrete pad on the side of a cliff somehow. Much more risk of it leaking or something and it's a vacation home I airbnb so sits vacant for long periods.

Electric pool heaters are small and can go right next to the pump/filter. I bought a cheap electric one just haven't installed yet. Will probably cost a couple hundred bucks a month but should get a few more weeks out of it.

 

[Solarcabin Channel]

I have a solar heated hot tub. I used a 12 volt solar fountain pump and circulate the water through 50ft of black sprinkler pipe sitting in the sun. The hot tub is also inside my greenhouse so it raises the temp pretty fast but that is a small amount of water and not what you need.

You can use an OD propane water heater like the Eccotemp used for camping and a 12 volt sure flow pump to recirculate the water but you need a filter and some chemicals might destroy the heater.

A good pool cover will help heat a small pool and they sell those on Amazon. I have one for my 8 foot pool.

 

[Crowz]

I have a 20k gallon pool and looking to keep it warmer during the summer and hopefully get a few more days.

Picked up an electric 24kw heater but needs 4ga 240 wiring. I'm wondering if there might be a better heater type to just run solar panels to an electric heater inline?

I don't want to run water thru one of those solar heaters because I'm not there often and don't trust it not to leak.

Can't I just find some heating element and size it to the max watts then plug directly to the solar panels? Put some disconnect relay on a temp sensor/flow sensor.

I know you want to avoid solar/water exchanger type setup for fear of leaks but from all of the stuff I tried with my pools I found it worked the best since one of the biggest headaches when using water and solar together was overheating and safe guards needed which are eliminated with a pool.

I found that even a small box enclosure with the water lines running across the face of it made a huge difference over time with a pool. We actually were able to use the pool pretty much year round with this setup. It was cooler in the winter but still warm enough to swim in it.

 

[glandpuck]

Okay, this is the problem. Your pool is too big to heat with anything but gas. Our system has a 400,000 BTU Raypak pool heater. The biggest electric heat pump unit they even make is like 160k btu to maybe 200k btu. It just takes too much power and solar is not there yet. My suggestion would be geothermal into the ground or a small nuclear reactor.

 

[Crowz]

To bad we never made it to the "every home will have a nuclear/atomic reactor one day".

Those were cool ads back in the day.

 

[Nobodybusiness]

Yupp. Problem is they're large and loud like a house heat pump. I considered these a while back but have to put it 20ft+ away from the pool pump and add a concrete pad on the side of a cliff somehow. Much more risk of it leaking or something and it's a vacation home I airbnb so sits vacant for long periods.

Electric pool heaters are small and can go right next to the pump/filter. I bought a cheap electric one just haven't installed yet. Will probably cost a couple hundred bucks a month but should get a few more weeks out of it.

My son has his own HVAC company.

I remember him calling me one day saying “ This guy has a 8 Ton pool heater “

The compressor went bad and he had to replace it.
Had to use a cherry picker to get it in the van.

Can’t remember what the compressor cost to replace but dang the amount of electricity to run that thing.