Heated by the Sun

Yesterday at 10:00am it was -5 outside with about 12" of snow on the ground.  Hello winter.  This is by far the coldest it has been since moving into our new house, so I was curious to see how the solar hot water panels were doing.  To my surprise the water inside the tubes was 157 degrees!  That same water heats the glycol that runs through our radiant floor heating system and keeps our house a toasty 72 degrees.  Add to that the passive solar design and we have a free heating system.  We pretty much will never pay a dime for heating our home.  The sun does it for us.  Best invention ever.

We received our first electricity bill since moving in.  We used half as much energy to run this 2500 square foot house than we did our 1000 square foot house in Golden this time of year.  We're planning on installing solar photovoltaic (electricity) panels when the ground thaws in the Spring that will eventually drop our bill to $0 and possibly even make us money from the electric company.  Since Rocky Mountain Power takes their customers for granted (and is a sorry excuse for a public utility company), I cannot wait for that day!

The house is coming along quite nicely.  We even have pictures hung on the walls and are definitely feeling settled in.  We're hosting Thanksgiving this year, so we're excited to have a house full of family!  Happy Thanksgiving to you all!

Tara