Man Heats 4,000 Sq. Ft Home for $2.50 Per Day Using Passive Solar Technology
Why spend lots of money heating your house when nature can do it for you? Upstate New York resident John Kosmer has taken passive solar to a new level in his home, which only costs $2.50 a day to heat. That’s less than $1,000 a year of heating expenses in an area of the country that gets mauled with snow multiple times a year.
Kosmer worked with Building With Integrity and Adirondack Alternative Energy to construct his passive solar house. Four-inch thick rigid polyurethane is installed on the exterior walls and under the roof, while pre-finished concrete siding covers the exterior of the home.
- » See also: Wave Energy Looking for Breakthrough — Using Aerospace Design
- » Get CleanTechnica by RSS or sign up by email.
But the real key to Kosmer’s low heating costs is his windows. 53 vinyl-framed Simonton windows are strategically placed throughout the house, letting sunlight into the white interior of the structure.
A wood stove also rises multiple stories into the atrium, where heated air is carried up into grilles in the attic ductwork. The air is then redistributed throughout the house, which stays at a temperature of 68 degrees.
A project of this magnitude may be out of your reach if you live in a 100 year-old poorly-insulated home, but it’s worth considering if you’re on the hunt for a new house.
Posts Related to Alternative Energy Sources:
- Green Gym Uses Human-Powered Energy
- Wind-Powered Tall Ships Are Once Again Important As Oil Prices Hurt Trade
- AquaSystem Makes Solar Thermal Accessible To The Masses
In Colorado, using natural gas central air heating, I spent $0.031 per square foot during a December with the average temperature (day and night) of 36°. That was without taking any steps to increase efficiency beyond what was there when I moved in. The electrical outlets leaked cold as you could feel the draft whenever you got near them to plug something in. Anyway, that works out to about $4.10 per day if it was 4,000 square feet. You decide whether this is an improvement. I also wonder if they’re including the cost of the wood in the wood-burning stove.
‘I heat my 1800 square foot home located in northern Indiana for $2.36/day with NATURAL GAS..’
i like how you think your method is better. but his 4000 sq ft to your 1800 sq ft is much more impressive since he only goes .14 cents higher then your cost. so his is actually much more cost effective then yours.
This is supposedly to be environmental beneficial?! woodstoves are some of the worst polluters of any heating or energy source!!!
Man Heats 4,000 Sq. Ft Home for Just $2.50 Per Day | nerdd.net…
\r\nWhy spend lots of money heating your house when nature can do it for you?\r\nKosmer worked with…
So what…I will be impressed when someone can COOL a home in central Texas during July and August for 2.50/day
This is just plain STUPID.
@ Evan “This is supposedly to be environmental beneficial?! woodstoves are some of the worst polluters of any heating or energy source!!!” -[citation needed]
Just as any heating method you have to know how operate the stove efficiently. Burning too cold and you have unburnt fuel (smoke) blowing out the chimney, this also forms dangerous creosote.
If You have hot flue temps (~450F), properly seasoned wood, and a good burn going for the type of wood all you should have coming out of your chimney is water vapor and some CO2.
I cut all my firewood, as most who use wood heat in Upstate NY, from my own land taking damaged, or standing deadwood first. Properly managed land can sustain a firewood supply for your home with as little as 5 acres.
So get off your high green horse.
They fail to mention those windows probably cost him $50,000
exactly….unfortunately.
“How many decades until it pays for itself, then?”
When we lived in Minnesota, we had a 4000sf home that was super-insulated. Over the 12 years we lived there, we paid an average of $265 per year to heat that home - in Minnesota with 7 months of winter and very cold temperatures. That’s less than many of our neighbors spent per month, and it includes the two years when Enron was inflating the costs of natural gas. When we bought the home and later sold the place, it cost about the same as other conventional, inefficient homes. Our new home in Arizona uses have the energy to heat and cool as other homes. We have no air conditioner…and it too cost the same to build as conventional construction. This can be done. It just takes some planning.