Heatpump and hydro

[skravlinge]

I friend of mine, is moving from town and have got a house, which has a stream running trough his land. He said he would need about 6 Kw/h to heat the house. To take so much out with a hydropowered generator can hardly be done, without disturbing the stream  and thats lives there. We thought  a hydrogenerator taking water for two kilowatt piped along the  height different needed and released downstreams will not make much impact of the stream. The second idea is to us the power to run a heatpump and  pump the heat from the stream. The water moves whole the time so it would not need to have to much piping in the stream, and risk of ice will be minor due to the streaming water. The goal of getting 6 kw would then be possible.

Have any of you tried this or have something to comment about this project?

[RP]

If you are concerned about changes to the stream by taking the full 6kw then you may want to consider the impact of 2kw worth of heatpump on the stream as well.  This will cause the water to become colder in the winter possibly adding to a freezing problem and warmer in the summer possibly affecting fish or wildlife.

I don't know enough about hydro to predict how much water volume is needed to provide 2kw of power.  Its possible that the volume is high enough that the heatpump's effect on temperature would be insignificant.

Hope this helps

rp

[finnsawyer]

I think the heat pump will have an ice build up problem.  There is, in fact, a boundary layer between the pipe and the water which does not move.  Ice build-up can begin there.  I've seen a heat pump freeze up even though there is a constant flow of water through it when the temperature difference becomes sufficient.

[kenneth keen]

This is a great idea. I had the same one but although I have had something like 3 tons of water a second passing under my place for the past ten years have still not managed to get round to harnessing the power!

Installing a regular heat pump is expensive and connecting the water wheel (in fact even getting hold of a waterwheel) is difficult. I found this site today and have joined to see if I can also get some of feedback about my own ideas.

Buying a lot of ready made equipment defeats the purpose of making our own power. One main reason for building it myself is because I know that everything I buy new will break within five years and if it costs thousands then that is what I will loose. If it only costs time and effort then I have only myself to blame if something doesn't work.

I hope you get more replies about the details. All I can say is in agreement with the other reply (pity that the message we are replying to is not somewhere on the screen so we can refer to its content...perhaps I have not checked the FAQ enough before I started!). Your piece in the water will freeze up most likely and another problem I can  foresee is that it will get clogged up with debris, twigs and leaves. You will need to create some sort of cage into which it can be lowered and then regularly removed for cleaning.

To date I have done nothing more than build my own water wheel. This was made from a leftover heavy duty cable drum of plastic. I used strong fencing wire to "sew" back and forward from side to side 16 "connectors" around which I looped carpet. I placed it in the river and it ran for a couple of months until a flood washed it downstream, along with the scaffolding with which it was secured.

OK, I have lots of energy myself and am very glad to have at last found a place to be able to exchange views on what we can do ourselves.

2004 12 06 21:17

Kenneth Keen

P.S. You should read your mail again before you send it, to check for mistakes...

[kenneth keen]

So no one has any comments on this? No one has done anything like this? Is there no one of you that has put a heat pump into a river or lake and pumped that heat into his house?

Hope someone can say "Yes I did and it works well and I have had it running for the past ten years".

If not then perhaps I am on the wrong planet!

[skravlinge]

Thank you, I will advice my friend to try it.

[kenneth keen]

One year later and not a single comment. No one uses a water source heat pump on this board. Well that is disappointing, but it will not stop me from getting on with my own project...

Kenneth Keen

[ghurd]

I don't see it as much different than goethermal, geothermal installers could do it I'm sure.

Should work fine.

G-

[hydrosun]

I missed this message last year. I was searching for another topic and came accross it. It may be too late now, but I'm running a heat pump with water from my hydro stream as the heat source.  I  put a water heat exchanger on the input freon line  of a Sunpentown portable air conditioner, heater.  It's designed for a 300 square foot room.  It uses about 700 watts and keeps my underground 1000 square foot house  close to 70 degrees if I run it 24 hrs/day.  This works for me because I've got a very well insulated home.  Also I'm running this unit only when I have enough power from the hydro stream. Which is when the flow is over 60gpm, when it is warm enough for heavy rain. So I'm not running much it when the stream flow is low and colder temperature.  We use our wood stove during that time.  The temperature of the water coming out of  the heat exchanger is only a few degrees colder than the water going in.

 So it is possible to heat a house with a heat pump off a hydro system if the house is well insulated and a smaller heat pump is used.

Chris

[kenneth keen]

Well Chris, I gave up more or less on this site and was really pleased to see I was not the only one on the planet with enough sense to think of this idea. I would really like to hear more of the details of your system. Are you turning the pump using water power or are you just hanging the water heat exchanger in the water and thus taking heat from the stream?

Where did you get the water heat exchanger? Do you have pictures or an internet site where it is featured?

Why do you say "it is possible to heat a house with a heat pump off a hydro system if the house is well insulated and a smaller heat pump is used", a smaller heat pump? Surely the larger the heat pump the more heat you can produce and hence you should be able to heat a large house...

Hope you reply to this quicker than I replied to yours!