Pool Care

Energy Efficient Swimming Pools

Energy Efficient Swimming Pools

Swimming pools lose energy in a variety of ways. The Department of Energy has found that water evaporation is overwhelmingly  the single largest source of energy over consumption, accounting for 70% of total energy lost in both outdoor and indoor pools.   It takes 1 Btu (British thermal unit) to raise 1 pound of water 1 degree, but each pound of 80ºF water that evaporates takes a whopping 1,048 Btu of heat out of the pool.
 
Lowering your pool operating costs:

Keeping the heat in:

1. Covering your pool when not in use to prevent heat loss can be the single most effective means in reducing evaporation. An automatic pool cover or a solar sun ring cover is the most efficient method of reducing evaporation.
2. In windy areas, you can add a windbreak—trees, shrubs, or a fence—to reduce evaporation. The windbreak needs to be high enough and close enough to the pool that it does not create turbulence over the pool, which will increase evaporation. You also don't want the windbreak to shade the pool from the sun, which helps heat it. A mere 7mph wind on the pool surface can increase energy consumption by 300%. The evaporation rate from an outdoor pool varies depending on the pool's temperature, air temperature and humidity, and the wind speed at the pool surface. The higher the pool temperature and wind speed and the lower the humidity, the greater the evaporation rate.


High efficiency heating:

1. If you are building a new pool, locate return lines in the floor of the pool.  This is the most efficient place to bring heated water into the pool. Floor returns or a Paramount in-floor cleaning systems can be used to accomplish this.
2. For existing pools point return inlets downward.  This will reduce water surface movement and evaporation.
3. Set the pool equipment valves so water being heated is being drawn from the top of the pool and returned to the lowest point.
4. Maintain efficient daily operations. Program your pool equipment to draw solar heated surface water through the surface skimmer and return to the bottom of the pool through a high flow pool cleaner or return inlets. Pool equipment operation hours should be while the pool cover or solar cover are in full sun.  This process alone could reduce cost of heating by 95%.
5. Backwash the pool filter only as much as necessary to avoid wasting water and energy. 
6. High-efficiency electric heat pumps.  A heat pump simply moves heat from the air and transfers it to the pool.
7. Properly sized pumps and motors can all save utility costs. 
8. Solar energy is abundantly available and environmentally friendly. Solar-powered heating systems can raise pool water temperatures 10°F to 20°F
 
For more information please also view the Department of Energy's website regarding energy efficiency and renewable energy.

Submitted by:
Aquatech Pools, Westchester, OH 
www.aquatechpools.com/ohio