Green / Eco-Friendly

Geothermal system Ottawa-Gatineau

  • Last Updated:
  • Sep 24th, 2013 3:39 pm
Newbie
Sep 12, 2011
3 posts
AYLMER

Geothermal system Ottawa-Gatineau

I live in Gatineau in a 2400 sq ft house. Back split lower level on a Slab. Id like to stay here after retirement and am considering an energy system I can afford after retirement. Currently heat with electric at equalized payments of about 300 per month. So I`m wondering about installing radiant heat in the floor and a geothermal system when the mortgage comes due - adding this in to the debt. I found this site http://www.geo-exchange.ca/en/ which has good info and lists of contractors but I`m leery about who really knows what they are talking about. I read a few horror stories about work being done by non-pro`s. Any advice is appreciated.
2 replies
Deal Addict
User avatar
Mar 8, 2002
4235 posts
880 upvotes
Ottawa
Your electricity bill sounds high for Quebec. I think you should look at the amount of kWh you're using in each month over a year, and then determine how much of your bill is actually for heating. Through this analysis you can determine if geothermal makes any financial sense for you.

For example:
Month, kWh
Jan 2000
Feb 2000
Mar 1800
Apr 1500
May 1000
Jun 1200
Jul 1300
Aug 1300
Sep 1000
Oct 1500
Nov 1500
Dec 1800

In this example with electric heat and cooling, the baseload is 1000 kWh a month (assuming May and Sept have no heating or cooling). So subtracting 1000 kWh from each of the heating months, this example had total annual consumption for heating of 5100 kWh.

For comparison, last year in Ontario I paid about $900 for natural gas heat and $1200 for electricity (lighting/appliances/electronics), and my house is 1900 sq ft.
Newbie
Sep 12, 2011
3 posts
AYLMER
Thank you for your reply MacGyver. 2 years on and I am still toying with what to do. I havent used your example yet but will as my mortgage is due in August and I want to make the right choices.

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