« Energy Positive in First Year | Main | Net zero 2014 »

11/20/2014

Comments

Feed You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

David Fay

Marc said: "MA residents are about to see a 30-35% rise in the supply portion of their electric bills due to last winter's natural gas price squeeze!"

Actually, for National Grid customers, the supply portion just increased by 100% (8.277 cents to 16.273 cents): https://www.nationalgridus.com/masselectric/non_html/MA_Residential_Table.pdf

It's the average total bill (combined supply and delivery) that increases by 37%. Other MA electric companies will soon follow with their own increases.

David Fay

Marc said: "The unit costs $440"

Actually, that's Canadian dollars. In American dollars, the price is $389. That doesn't make much difference unless you do the installation yourself.

Kate Stephenson

Happy to install and test for you! I think I have an easily accessible shower drain. But I am wondering about the application of this technology for a commercial kitchen application with 3 bay sink and commercial dishwasher at Yestermorrow. Now THAT uses a lot of hot water.

Marc Rosenbaum

The Ecodrain should work well on any hot water fixture that has simultaneous drain water and hot water draw. So, not bathtubs and washing machines, for example.

Dana

In MA you'd need a variance to install an EcoDrain version, since it's not on the pre-approved list of plumbing fixutures for potable plumbing.

SFAIK only the only listed drainwater recovery series that wouldn't require a variance are Renewability PowerPipe series and EcoInnovation's ThermoDrain series. But being gravity-film types they only work efficiently when mounted vertically.

http://license.reg.state.ma.us/pubLic/pl_products/pb_search.asp?type=P&manufacturer=EcoInnovation+Technologies+Inc&stype=spec&model=&product=&description=&psize=50

http://license.reg.state.ma.us/pubLic/pl_products/pb_search.asp?type=P&manufacturer=Renewability+Energy+Inc.&stype=spec&model=&product=&description=&psize=50

It would be an easier sell if they were to jump through whatever documentation loops necessary to get the EcoDrain listed, avoiding the permitting & inspection headache.

What David Fay said about the winter-rates for Nat'l Grid- it's a 100% uptick on the supply portion, a 37% uptick on the total, which puts the residential retail rate at about 24-25 cents/kwh, about 16-17 cents of which is the supply.

At 16 cents it's possible to beat that by switching suppliers. It's possible buy 100% renewables from some of the power resellers (who buy long term power purchase agreements from various generators,as well as buying up SRECs and other renewable credits in various markets.) I locked in at 12 cents/kwh for 3 years from one of those.

At 16 cents/kwh it's also well over what a even rooftop solar PV lease deal would cost you. A PV purchase would be even better than a lease for the creditworthy, especially in states (like MA) where Solar City will be offering 30 year money at 4% (and a 30 year guarantee!) for the purchase of their systems. They will soon have competition, count on it! At 4% interest, even without the 30% income tax credit, rooftop PV would come in well under the 24 cents/kwh, or even the 16 cent energy-only portion!

Eric

Hm, David, the website says $439.95 USD. Anyway; less expensive than even the smaller power pipes. I'll have to look at the claimed BTU recovery of each. Seems like it has more PVC and less copper overall, which makes economic sense to me. I wish this had been available when we did our renovation; I may still see if I can fit one in somewhere. Thanks for the post!

Marc Rosenbaum

Thanks David for your clarifications, I'm having some issues with Typepad in responding to comments.

The comments to this entry are closed.