Geothermal heating is an idea that sets out to give a good alternative to normal furnace heating. Geothermal heat pumps are meant to offer a energy efficient form of heating that works for any space. The idea is that the only power it uses is electricity, and this can be used to year-round heat and cool your house. If you don’t need to pay for the expensive and fluctuant oil/gas prices you can make back that money that you’re saving
The first part of a geothermal heat pump is the well. In our model we have a vertical well, which would go down in a closed loop up to 500 feet down in the ground, but in other designs It can have horizontal well(b) which is approximately 5-10 feet below the surface, but would be spread out across a larger horizontal range. There is another option which is called an open well. These wells are also really deep in the ground and pump ground water to the heat pump, then return it back into the ground. These wells are filled with antifreeze or water, which circulates around the closed circuit and is naturally heated to a temperature of approximately 10 degrees. This may not seem that hot, but this is where the heat pump comes in. The heated antifreeze is run past another closed loop of liquid refrigerant, transferring the little heat it has to the refrigerant. In the winter, the liquid refrigerant is run into an electric compressor which turns the refrigerant into a gas and makes it extremely hot,up to 65 degrees. Then, this gas is put into a coil. Turning those coils hot. Then, outside air is sucked in and blown across the coils, and into the house. The air cools the refrigerant and turns it back into its liquid form, and the cycle continues. During the summer, the process can create cold air to cool down the house, simply by reversing the flow of the refrigerant.
Geothermal Pumps are a energy efficient, low maintenance, source of heat. Geothermal heat pumps are also really economically friendly as they produce almost no pollution or negative effects on the earth. However there are also some downsides to investing in geothermal heating, like the cost. Upfront prices range from 10,000 to 20,000 dollars. These prices can double if you are putting one of these systems in an old house that doesn’t already have it. the hope is of course that the hefty upfront cost will pay for itself with enough use. This isn’t that hard because unlike normal furnaces or heating systems, geothermal heating can be used to heat the smallest of houses to the biggest warehouses or commercial areas.
I believe it solves the environmental issue, providing more than sufficient heat with almost no added cost of fuel like gas or oil, however, it does have a huge upfront price as previously mentioned. If there was a lesser cost and a way to implement this in preexisting buildings, I think that it would for sure complete its task, but as it stands today, it serves as a good “mid ground” before we get to the ideal end game solution.
