Last post, we spoke of heat pump water heaters. If you want to invest in your house, what are some plausible options to save money and reduce carbon dioxide pollution?
- Heat pump water heaters – Given their efficiency for turning electricity into heat, the energy savings and carbon dioxide savings from not using methane gas are immense. Last month we used 76 CCF of methane gas. According to epa.gov, the carbon dioxide calculation for methane gas is 0.0551 metric tons CO2/Mcf.
- 7600 cubic feet / 1000 * 12 months * 0.0551 ( 1 MCF = 1000 cubic feet, 1 CCF = 100 cubic feet) gives us a whopping 5 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year!!! That’s really insane.
- Next up, I’m going with solar panels. Our system cost $70,000 for a 16 kW system. That’s a lot of money. For most people you can get a smaller system for less money. Our 16 kW system will save 20 metric tons of carbon dioxide a year. We were fortunate enough to get a 1.99% and 2.49% loan for 25 years. At those terms, we’re saving money every year. Solar panel utility will he highly dependent on financing terms.
- Third, get an electrical vehicle. Our Model 3 is the most efficient vehicle in the US. It gets 132 MPGe. Suppose you drive 12,000 miles in your gas vehicle and get 30 MPG. That’s 400 gallons of gas a year. Each gallon is 8 lbs of carbon dioxide. That’s 3,200 lbs / 1,454 kg of CO2 a year saved, assuming you charge your EV fully from solar. If you leased a 3 from Tesla, you could get one for $4,500 down and $349 a month for 36 months. The other options are cheaper and save more CO2.
- Last, Tesla Powerwall or equivalent battery system. A Powerwall after tax credit is about $10,000. The usable capacity is 12.2 kWh. If you were able to use and fill up the battery every day that’s 12.2 x 365 or 4,453 kWh. Our local electricity cost is 0.17 a kWh. That’s about $757 in savings every year. It will take 13 years to get paid back. As a comparison, our solar system in 3+ months has produced 6,420 kWh of energy.
Even though those energy tech options are cool and hip, probably the best value for your money is getting your house weatherproofed and better insulated. Energy efficiency is underrated. Another option is replacing all your light bulbs with LEDs. They’ll generate less heat and use less electricity.
As with most things in life, we did it in reverse. We got an EV first, then solar panels, then heat pump water heaters. We left out heat pump systems for heating and cooling. We’ll cover that another day and update.
Sincerely yours,
smilingdad
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