THSCC Forums

You can reduce your electric bill spring-fall by having window tint installed to reduce solar heat gain into your home. Unfortunately the data below shows my electric usage after window tint and hvac changes, but from a comfort standpoint the tinting makes the house noticeably cooler. I used nano-ceramic stuff, but there is less expensive film choices available, i.e regular dyed films like 3M.



February of 2008: window film installed and the savings begin.

(We use gas for heating.)

The spike in June was attributed to my upstairs zone hvac starting to die out. New system installed early July.

I keep my house very cool in the summer: Upstairs between 70-72, downstairs between 67-70 (with duct work/air flow to get the master bedroom down to 63 degrees at night).

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Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.

What's the cost on the tint? We're probably in the market for new windows in the next few years (to go with the new roof). Apparently, if you don't keep up with the paint on wooden windows they will start to rot (duh)

Scott

Nano-ceramics: $11-16 sq/ft installed.
Dyed films: half that. Dyed films are subject to fade, though, so choose carefully.

I'd go cheap on the windows and add tint. Cost would be the same or less than going with 'better' windows. Be careful of warranty implications. Most good film companies warrant your windows since the mfg will cancel theirs out.

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Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.

We use tint on windows that gets a great deal of sun and while I don't have numbers to back it up, I believe they help keep the house cooler.

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Richard Casto
1972 Porsche 914
2013 Honda Fit Sport
2015 Honda Fit EX
http://motorsport.zyyz.com
Money can't buy happiness, but somehow it's more comfortable to cry in a Porsche than a Kia.

And we just close the blinds.

The effects of the sun can be beneficial so the opposite is true in the winter.

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Vincent Keene
'06 Ford Mustang GT (track rat)
'15 Dodge Charger R/T (yeah, it's got a HEMI!)
'07 Ford Fusion SE (205,000 miles and counting)
'98 Chevy Z-24 (retired)
'93 Acura Integra (Team SWB 24HOL Car)

You still let solar energy in with closed blinds. What you stop is fading of curtains and furniture. Winter heat is temporary heat (it goes fast once darkness hits) unless you are intentionally heating dark tile or other thermal mass for slow heat release at night. I have seen no detrimental affect on my gas bill with the solar film.

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Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.

I don't remember the number exactly, I'm sure you guys are closer to reality. I can tell you that financially speaking it is still a poor investment at 10 year payback and 20 year lifetime. Far better ROI available elsewhere _at today's enery prices_. That's when I stopped looking. I was hoping for a $5-10k system with a 5 year payback. I'd do that pretty easily (even though it's still not a great investment _financially_)

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Mike Whitney
whit32@gmail.com, 919-454-5445
V10, V8, V8t, I6, I6, V6, F4t, I4, I4, I4, I4, I2, 1, 1

Solar wasn't an option when I realized I liked having my house in the trees and not in the middle of a field. Trees are good. Bulldozing houses with wild abandon to put up a field of houses with barely any room for grass, let alone replanting trees is bad. If you can say there are any good side effects from this current economic situation it is that we will stop doing that for a few years, anyway.

Of course, I also live in an area where the trees are really big, too. Some areas of the state you could be living mostly in the trees and still make use of solar on the house.

Oh, and while the solar farm at SAS is neat, what's the carbon trade-off on what the trees could have cleaned versus what the solar power offsets from not having to burn something to produce that same electricity? Sure, I could see putting solar on top of things that already preclude having trees there (like rooftops), but clearing a big area for it? I can't really get behind that.

Oh, and I'm no tree-hugger. I believe that not only having trees is good, but farming trees is better. I particularly like this article about the topic.


--Donnie

Very interesting article- thanks for the link.

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Carl Fisher

Be Cool to the Pizza Dude:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... Id=4651531

I'm working on building a tracking system for one of the solar panel arrays on the duke Smart Home right now. Basically the power company pays you for the power you make with the panels; none of the electricity from the panels goes into your home; it all goes into the grid. For the smart home, they just get paid a set amount every month because the meter that measure output does not function correctly. The professor we are working with said that this was very common to just get paid a flat rate by the power company.

The Smart Home was designed from the ground up to be "green" and it cost a LOT of money. It is nowhere close to making all of its own power.

The buy back times for solar panels are too high right now. Solar panel trackers (actively tilt the solar panel towards the sun to increase power output) are one idea for increasing output, but buy back time is again the enemy.

I'll get back to you at the end of the semester when I've solved that problem.