Drilling

Pardon the brief interruption while a bit of travel transpired.  Always good to see another part of the country and get fresh eyes.

Meanwhile, back at Owl Manor, they were drilling.  And we were very, very

Drilling for bedrock

lucky.  No black gold, just bedrock, which is exactly what we wanted.  They hit it only 14 feet below the surface, which is about as good as it gets when one is drilling wells for geothermal heat systems.  It took the crew just two days to complete the three wells they needed, leaving behind these funny-looking tubes sprouting from the

Wells sprouting

back yard.  Eventually, they will be hooked up to the system in the house, and the closed system of liquid inside will be what regulates the temperature indoors.

Inside, they’ve also placed the three air handlers that will comprise the heating and cooling zones for the house.  Because of the extensive insulation we’re doing, in spite of its size, the house will use just a 3-ton air conditioning system.

Unfortunately, even today geothermal requires a substantial upfront investment from the homeowner.  But when all was said and done, after computing the

One of three air handlers

substantial tax credits, for us, the price difference between a new gas-powered furnace and A/C system and the geothermal system was about $10,000.  That’s nothing to sneeze at.  We also know the previous owner was spending $800 or more per month to cool the house in the summer, albeit through an inefficient patchwork retrofit of ductwork.

We can already tell that the house holds a pretty standard temperature inside, even without any climate-control system running (or even some of the openings actually sealed up).  If we have done this right, we ought to be able to pretty much heat it with a candelabra and cool it with a few bowls of ice, which will bring our cost of living lower than the far smaller house we occupy today.