POTABLE WATER SYSTEMS

City water:

• Contains chlorine which is harmful to plant life. De-chlorinate before using.
• Can be expensive even for residential use.
• Has a much larger carbon foot print than well water.
• If you don't pay your water bill, they can cut you off.
• The water bill is often used to index a sewer charge which is added on.
• Requires you to earn income, pay taxes and use after tax income to pay bill.
• Supports a government or private company which is only looking at the revenue stream.
• New construction usually involves a considerable amount of money for a "connection fee".
• Water can be rationed by order of the government.
• City water is usually too expensive for commercial crops.
• Governments which sell water usually are against grey water re-use.

Well water:

• Risk of a dry hole
• Finding water -- use water witching -- two brass welding rods with 6" bent handles. When they cross, there's water.
• Well drilling costs are high.
• Most states have a database of well logs in your area. Find the cite (like Department of Resources), examine the logs to find out at what depth water was found. Also find sustainable rate of flow based in infiltration rate.
• Use a professional water engineer to advise you where to put the well and specifications of bore, pump, electrical, well head, casings, valves and filters.
• First filter is at the well head and is a discharging, self-cleaning sand and debris filter. Check once a week and more often if heavy use. Use this water for all of your irrigation needs.
• Whole house filter. Use a swimming pool filter, usually with diatomacious earth set in fins inside the filter. Filters are generally cleaned by back charging. Follow the manufacturer's manual. Water is suitable for non-drinking and cooking use, if not mineralized.
• Removal of unwanted minerals: Use water softener or Zeolite filter (trade name for a resin filter).
• Purification: Kill harmful pathogens by chlorination, ultra-violet radiation, ozone treatment, or micro-wave radiation .
• For drinking and cooking, use activated carbon filter. Models are available for faucet spout attachment and for under-the-sink installation. Larger, whole house filters are also available.
• Low cost to operate

Piping:

• Use Schedule 80 PVC between the pump and the well head. Thread the ends and use galv. steel or better yet, stainless steel couplings.
• Pump needs a check valve on the output side, and a sand filter on the intake side. Buy the best pump you can afford, as maintenance costs are very high. Pump should be 220/240 volts; three phase if you can afford it and have three phase to the well head; otherwise single phase is very commonly used and much less expensive.
• Make sure your water supply lines are PVC, not galvanized steel, are at least 1 and 1/2" ID (2" is better for domestic use. If you are irrigating crops, go for a 3" or 4" transmission line.
• Bury the pipe below the frost line in gravel and cover with one foot of gravel on top of which put down a 4" ribbon the metal tape and also a heavy copper wire( at least 12 gauge. The tape is to alert a person digging near the pipe to avoid hitting the pipe with a tool. The copper wire allows a metal detector to fin the pipe up to three feet deep.
• Stake the major ends, turns and intervals of the pipe and draw an "as-built" map showing the number states and the route of the pipeline.

Well pump:

• Well pumps can be single phase or three phase. Choose three phase if you can. Most all well pumps ate 220/240 volts. Buy the largest and best pump you can which fits in the boare and lower it to abut 50 feet from the bottom of the boare.

Storage tank.

• You will need storage tank equal to about two weeks water use. A 2500 would do for a 3000 sq. ft home and a 10,000 gallon tank for a modestly small farming operation would be appropriate. A banionette type booster pump at a storage tank.
• Your well pump can fill the storage tank. The pipe from the well is routed to the top of the tank and through a mechanical float valve. When the tank is full, the valve shuts and creates back pressure to the pump. The pump senses this back pressure and shuts off. When the water level in the tank drops, the back pressure drops and the pump starts up. This way, the pump does not start and stop every time some one turns on a faucet for a few seconds so that the pump does not short-cycle.
• The mechanical float valve works but is subject to failure. The length of the arm to the float determines the set points. A better way is to use electronic float valves. This float contains a sensor which when horizontal, breaks the contact. When vertical, makes the contact, thereby stopping and starting the well pump. The length of the cord determines the set points. Many types of electronic float valves are available at reasonable prices. The wiring of the pump requires that the power to the pump be either routed through the float valve or the float valve must be tied to a relay switch which can receive a signal from the electronic float valve and start and stop energy to the well pump.
• Set points and tank size. The lower set point will probably be determined by fire regulations. Consult your County's Fire Marshal. Usually the lowest amount of stored water is about 30 minutes of continuous use of a fire pump which can consume 50 gallons a minute; 50 gpm x 30 minutes is 1500 gallons which is for a house fire. A wildfire will take more so plan on 2500 gallons minmium. Figure ten days minimum domestic use above 2500 gallons at 300 gal per family of four per day or 3000 gallons, for a total of a 5500 gallon tank. A 5000 gallon tank is a common capacity, so buy one of those tanks. Buy a double wall tank with four inches of foam insulation if you are in a realy cold climate and are concerned about freezing or you could install the tank in a heated, insulated shed. A straw bale shed, with a double pane patio slider door facing the south would be a good choice.
• Booster pump. Unless your storage tank is at least 70 feet above the highest point of use of storage water, you will need a booster pump. The typical ones for a low head (32 psi is the legal mimimum) is a centrifical pump. These are cheaper than the booster pump and can be sized to fit the needs. These will typically be single phase, 220240 volts, with about seven amps on each hot leg. An outlet port of one and one-half inches is common.
• Mount the pump at the foot of the storage tank and wire to a sub-panel which has both a 15 amp, double pole, duplex breaker and a 15 amp double fused quick disconnect switch (code required). Install an in-water line pressure switch --buy the larger Square D pressure switch:

http://www.drillspot.com/products/122464/Square_D_9013FRG22J19_Pressure_Switch

• Pull the cover and with the system in operation, using a nut driver, set the start and stop points so that at the highest elevation of use of water has 40 psi and that shuts off the booster pump at about 65 psi. Install inline, a water pressure gauge. Figure that, usinga 2" supply line, the pressure drop will be at 2.43 psi per foot of difference in elevation between the booster pump and the highest elevation of use of water from that pump.
• As an added precaution to make sure that the pump never "runs dry" -- that is continuing to operate with no liquid flow -- install an inline pressure relief vaue which is adjustable to say 40 to 125 psi and set about ten pounds above the high psi set point. Should there be a blockage in the pipe on the output side, the booster pumps will over pressure and the relief valve will open, spilling the water to an outlet pipe.
• If you really want safety, install a flow detector on the outlet pipe with an wired alarm signal to your house, garage or office or to your computer or to your cell phone via an autodialer.

Water quality.

• When you get your system first in operation, fill the storage tank full of water and dump in about five gallons of 15 percent bleach (sodium hypochlorate) -- available from Home Depot in the one gallon blue plastic bottle). Stir with an electric, large paint mixer for three days, then discharge all of the water, refill and discharge again, then refill. Many well drillers include this cleaning operation in their contract.
• Contact a licensed water quality laboratory, obtain the sterile vials and instructions. When you are plumbing the booster pump, install a hose bib down stream of the pump's outlet. Take your samples from this hose bib after flaming the opening with a butane log lighter. Take the samples and deliver to the lab along with your check. The reports from the lab will be needed for your building permit -- environmental health department. The test will determine the biological content and the nitrate contents (typically).

Hydro-pneumatic tank.

• In order to prevent your booster pump from short-cycling, you will need to install a hydro-pneumatic tank. This tank has a bladder filled with about 40 psi in the top of a 100 gallon tank. As the booster pump addes water, it compresses the bladder until the back pressure is at your high set poin, thus signaling the pressure switch to turn off the booster pump. As the water is withdrawn from the tank, the bladder expands, lower the pressure to the low set poin and turning on the booster pump.
• This process gives your booster pump some rest, reduces the heat load, and reduces your energy costs. It, along with the storage tank, also extends the life of the well pump which is far more expensive that the booster pump and much more costly to remove and redeploy.
• By adding air or removing air in the bladder, you can adjust the set points. The more air, the less draw down before the booster pumps starts. The less air, the more drawn down before the booster pump starts. The objective in adjusting the set points on the pressure switch and the air pressure in the bladder is to use the booster pump as little as needed to get the water pressure needed for domestic use.

I built a house in the back country of San Diego County, outside of the limits of the Alpine Fire Protection District. I had fire protection from a volunteer fire district which had a station ten miles ( and 30 minutess) away. the AFPD had a mutual aid pack with the latter fire district, but only for structual fires, not wild fires. The AFPD was only 8 minutes away from my house I was in a brushy area and in 2001, an 85 million dollar brush fire, burned down the home due east of me, spared my home under construction but burned the lower pad, three containers full of construction materials and personal property, some equipment at a loss of $43,000. I elected to install a 7,500 gallon tank on the upper pad, above the middle pad on which the home was being built. That required a booster pump which could pump above a 70 foot head. I paid Grainger about $570 for the booster pump and installed it along with the plumbing for the fire and storage tank. I also had a 2500 gallon tank near the well head which I shared with neighbor. After the fire, he had a will drilled and installed an 8000 gallon storage tank. I also installed a code fire hydrant about 50 feet lateral from and about ten feet down hill from the fire water and domestic water storage tank. The line was a four inch PVC line but with galvanized steel coming out of the ground to the water tank and coming out of the ground to the fire hydrant.

Additionally, I extended the 4" PVC line to two "wharf head" hydrants with 2.5" fire hose connections to the extreme east and west sides of the middle pad where my house was constructed.

The tank was laid on it's side with a 2" port at the center of the west facing end, to which I attached the domestic water supply. Thus there was always 3,750 gallons of fire water below the domestic outport which would always be available for fire water. The Fire Marshal approved this design. Too bad I did not have this sytem installed at the time of the January 3, 2001, Alpine fire.

On Demand Circulating Pumps

Jun
14

Energy saving hot water pump
posted by Mark Franklin

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In 2004, Saves You Energy, a San Diego company that develops and manufactures water and energy conservation technologies, introduced the On Demand Intelligent Pumping System which reduces energy required to provide domestic hot water by 30% or more.

Providing hot water for household uses such as showering, cooking or washing clothes in apartments, condominiums, hotels and motels requires a great deal of natural gas, propane, electricity or heating oil. Large boilers or commercial water heaters heat the water at one central location in a building and the hot water is distributed to residents or guests by pumping hot water through circulation pipes (also known as circulation lines or loop). Recent studies have shown that people only use hot water about 15% to 20% of the time. Circulation pipes are filled with hot water 24 hours a day, seven days a week - even when people are not using hot water. When the pipes are filled with hot water they are continually losing their energy to the ambient environment. As much as 50% of the energy required to heat water to an acceptable level is lost in the circulation loop. The answer is to turn the circulation pump off when no one is using hot water. One solution is to use a timer that turns the pump off at preset times. Unfortunately this requires someone to guess when hot water will be needed (this strategy may work in a small apartment or condominium complex but would leave hotel and motel guests less than satisfied). A better solution is to monitor hot water usage and only turn the pump on when hot water is needed. Of course turning off the pump defeats the purpose of having the hot water circulating in the building in the first place – providing hot water in a timely manner. The On Demand Intelligent Pumping System solves this problem by replacing the existing low speed pump (typically 2 to 7 gpm) with a high speed pump (20 to 26 gpm). As soon as a demand for hot water is detected by a flow sensor installed in the cold water make-up line (when a hot water faucet is turned on hot water leaves the system and must be made up with cold water from the providing utility) the high speed pump rushes hot water through the circulation pipe in a matter of a few seconds. In tests performed by the California Energy Commission in 2006 The On Demand Intelligent Pumping System reduced energy consumption by an average of 37% in the buildings tested. For more information on the On Demand Intelligent Pumping System go to www.SavesYouEnergy.com

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SOLAR WATER HEATING

INSTALLATION BASICS FOR HOME SOLAR HOT WATER SYSTEMS.

Planning to install a solar domestic hot water (SDHW) system? You’ll need some basic plumbing, electrical, mechanical, and carpentry skills. Theories and concepts are good background for any work, but putting a wrench, saw, torch, or other tool on the parts is what gets the job accomplished.	Access: Chuck Marken, AAA Solar Supply Inc., 2021 Zearing NW, Albuquerque, NM 87104 • 800-245-0311 or 505- 243-4900 • Fax: 505-243-0885 • info@aaasolar.com www.aaasolar.com Ken Olson, SoL Energy, PO Box 217, Carbondale, CO 81623 • Phone/Fax: 720-489-3798 • sol@solenergy.org www.solenergy.org

http://www.homepower.com/view/?file=HP94_pg50_Marken

Simplified installation of solar domestic hot water http://www.homepower.com/view/?file=HP107_pg18_Patterson Access John Patterson, Mr. Sun Solar, 3838 SW Macadam Ave., Portland, OR 97239 • 888-SOL-RELY or 503-222-2468 • Fax: 503-245-3722 • john@mrsunsolar.com • www.mrsunsolar.com Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), 805 15th St. NW, #510, Washington, DC 20005 • 202-682-0556 • Fax: 202-682-0559 • info@seia.org • www.seia.org • Listings of manufacturers, distributors & installers of solar energy systems National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), 1617 Cole Blvd., Golden, CO 80401 • 303-275-3000 • www.nrel.gov • Renewable resource maps & data	Tel (207) 338-9513 129 Miller St. www.sol-air.com Fax (208) 978-7839 Belfast, Maine, U.S.A. 04915 Copyright © 2003 Sol-Air Company Email kreamer@adelphia.net 1-24-03 – 1 – HOW TO BUILD A HIGH-EFFICIENCY, AIR-TYPE SOLAR SPACE HEATING COLLECTOR OVERVIEW INTRODUCTION These instructions are for a homebuilt version of Sol-Air Company's air-based SHVC™(Solar Heating / Ventilation Cooling) Solar System; please see the description at the end). Our commercial unit differs from the homebuilt version in its patented internal air-handler, automatic four- season mode-switching, and proprietary high-surface-area filament-matrix absorber. Selective Matrix™ Absorber Material is available for your own uses, see the contact info at the bottom of the page. Homebuilt Solar Collector Output Like its commercial cousin, this homebuilt unit produces more energy for the money by far than other forms of solar utilization, including PV and solar DHW systems. The output for a 20 square foot unit is approximately 5,000,000 Btu per year, equal to approx. 50 gallons of heating oil (or 50 Therms of natural gas). This output is produced primarily in the spring and fall, with a decided dead spot in the middle of a cold winter.
I was dazzled on a cold November morning in 1979 to see my new solar water heater turn on. The gauges showed 50°F (10°C) water going to the collectors and 60°F (16°C) water coming back. At that moment, I became a believer. Even in the cloudiest climates, the sun can provide 50 to 60 percent of a household’s annual water heating, and in sunnier places, 80 percent or more. How does it work? Here is a simple breakdown of the most common solar water heating systems and their main components.	Systems vary—not all equipment is necessary for every system type. For the sake of simplicity, some lesser yet necessary, components have been omitted. Equipment such as drain and fill valves, temperature and pressure relief valves, air vents, check valves, and temperature and flow gauges are important to the safety and function of these systems. See past Home Power articles for detailed descriptions of the importance, placement, and use of these components. http://cache.search.yahoo.net/search/cache?ei=UTF-8&p=how+to+build+solar+hot+air+collectors&fr=slv8-hptb8&rs=0&u=www.builditsolar.com/Projects/SpaceHeating/Kreamer%2520Air%2520Collector.pdf&w=build+solar+hot+air+collectors+collector+collector%27s&d=InJ7ehg5RJGz&icp=1&.intl=us
How to Build a Solar Hot Water System by John Canivan http://www.jc-solarhomes.com/how_to.htm	Ninety years ago, mine owners in the high country of Chile were faced with the problem of providing drinking water for their workers. The only available supply was unfit to drink, and so a means of purifying the liquid had to be found. Amazingly, the solution was a sun-operated distilling plant in which a large area of glassed-over wooden frames evaporated the contaminated water, recondensed it . . . and thus produced as much as 6,000 gallons of fresh water in a day! http://www.motherearthnews.com/Renewable-Energy/1974-09-01/How-To-Build-and-Use-A-Solar-Still.aspx
Solar Collectors This home in Nevada has an integral collector storage (ICS) system to provide hot water. Solar collectors are the key component of active solar-heating systems. Solar collectors gather the sun's energy, transform its radiation into heat, then transfer that heat to water, solar fluid, or air. The solar thermal energy can be used in solar water-heating systems, solar pool heaters, and solar space-heating systems. There are several types of solar collectors: Flat-plate collectors Evacuated-tube collectors Integral collector-storage systems	Contrary to what you might think, solar heating installations don't have to be complicated and expensive in order to do the job. We proved this to ourselves not long ago when we outfitted a home—an old adobe dwelling located high (8,000 feet) in the mountains of northern New Mexico—with a bare-bones simple, yet highly effective, $25 solar heating system ` http://www.motherearthnews.com/Renewable-Energy/1976-09-01/This-Solar-Heater-Pays-For-Itself-Every-Five-Weeks.aspx

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Solar hot water panels for heating a swimming pool in the Netherlands

Solar hot water refers to water heated by solar energy. Solar heating systems are generally composed of solar thermal collectors, a fluid system to move the heat from the collector to its point of usage, and a reservoir or tank for heat storage and subsequent use. The systems may be used to heat water for home or business use, for swimming pools, underfloor heating or as an energy input for space heating and cooling and industrial applications.
In many climates, a solar heating system can provide up to 85% of domestic hot water energy.[1] In many northern European countries, combined hot water and space heating systems (solar combisystems) are used to provide 15 to 25% of home heating energy.
In the southern regions of Africa like Zimbabwe, solar water heaters have been gaining popularity, thanks to the Austrian[2] and other EU funded projects that are promoting more environmentally friendly water heating solutions.
Residential solar thermal installations can be subdivided into two kinds of systems: compact and pumped systems. Both typically include an auxiliary energy source (electric heating element or connection to a gas or fuel oil central heating system) that is activated when the water in the tank falls below a minimum temperature setting such as 50 °C. Hence, hot water is always available. The combination of solar hot water heating and using the back-up heat from a wood stove chimney to heat water[3] can enable a hot water system to work all year round in northern climates without the supplemental heat requirement of a solar hot water system being met with fossil fuels or electricity