Energy efficient swimming pool pumps? No!

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sschullo
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Energy efficient swimming pool pumps? No!

Post by sschullo »

We installed this pump last November thinking that there would be a reduction in our energy use. NOPE, NADA, NOTHING! http://www.pentairpool.com/pool-owner/r ... ypumps.htm

I called the company and the local installers (who are useless) to make sure the settings were set right and the hours per day, etc. etc. I even lowered the setting so that the monitor barely measures a green light for proper water flow volume and the minimum hours per day at the risk of the pool turning green.
NOTHING worked. Our power bill is the same as with our older 1.5 horse motor which worked perfectly fine.

Of course the installers and the company are stunned. Out of 300 other people, I am told that I am the only one not happy. Also, I called my local power company who issued a check as partial payment to encourage their customers to buy this thing: You better sit down when I tell you that the company never did any independent study on the sales claims that you will save up to 90% reduction in power that the swimming pool pump uses (see link). Furthermore, they were not the least bit interested in what I said. But they put out thousands if not millions promoting this program!!!!

Bottom line is do NOT buy a new energy efficient variable speed pump unless you absolutely need to replace a worn out pump. They are quiet.

Those energy savings claims are greatly exaggerated if not possibly a hoax.

Has anybody else had similar experience?
Stev
Never in the history of market day-traders’ has the obsession with so much massive, sophisticated, & powerful statistical machinery used by the brightest people on earth with such useless results.
mikep
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Post by mikep »

FWIW I installed the Intelliflo variable speed pump and immediately saw ~$30 month savings on my bill.

My old pump used 2.2 kW (I think it was 1.5 HP). In the manual there is a wattage/speed curve, you may want to take a look to see what it set to. I set around 400W and run 16hr the day to still turn over the water 1x/day and I get about 1 PSI thru the filter (I don't have a light to tell me how fast I have to push water through the filter, I figure if I see some pressure all is well).

As I remember the numbers were about, give or take a few:
before: 2.2kW * 6 hr/ day = 13.2 kWH/day @ .18/kWH (my tier 2 summer rate) = $2.38/day
after: 400W * 16hr / day = 6.4 kWH/day @ .18/kWH = $1.152/day

I paid about $630 for this pump wholesale from my pool guy about 2 years ago and I have been pleased with the energy savings as I have about broken even.

Could your filter be too dirty - what is the pressure through the filter?
How many hours are you running/day?
Do you have to run high speed to get to the roof for solar heating - is it 1 story or 2 story house?
How big is the pool?

If you have a smart meter, it might tell you what the actual wattage/usage is for the pool pump so you can adjust real time.

Found the manual.. see the curves on p53. Target the GPM needed to get 16hr/day turnover, and figure the head resistance of your system (your installer should be able to tell you), then dial the RPM of the pump for minimum pressure through the filter and you approximately get your kW used from the chart.

http://www.recsupply.com/Documents/Pent ... Manual.pdf

Based on those curves I could probably adjust mine down a little more. Also, my old pool pump was dying when I replaced.

Also see http://swimming.about.com/od/poolandspa ... p_size.htm
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sschullo
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Post by sschullo »

mikep wrote:FWIW I installed the Intelliflo variable speed pump and immediately saw ~$30 month savings on my bill.

My old pump used 2.2 kW (I think it was 1.5 HP). In the manual there is a wattage/speed curve, you may want to take a look to see what it set to. I set around 400W and run 16hr the day to still turn over the water 1x/day and I get about 1 PSI thru the filter (I don't have a light to tell me how fast I have to push water through the filter, I figure if I see some pressure all is well).

As I remember the numbers were about, give or take a few:
before: 2.2kW * 6 hr/ day = 13.2 kWH/day @ .18/kWH (my tier 2 summer rate) = $2.38/day
after: 400W * 16hr / day = 6.4 kWH/day @ .18/kWH = $1.152/day

I paid about $630 for this pump wholesale from my pool guy about 2 years ago and I have been pleased with the energy savings as I have about broken even.

Could your filter be too dirty - what is the pressure through the filter?
How many hours are you running/day?
Do you have to run high speed to get to the roof for solar heating - is it 1 story or 2 story house?
How big is the pool?

If you have a smart meter, it might tell you what the actual wattage/usage is for the pool pump so you can adjust real time.

Found the manual.. see the curves on p53. Target the GPM needed to get 16hr/day turnover and power curve to get the kW used. http://www.recsupply.com/Documents/Pent ... Manual.pdf

Based on those curves I could probably adjust mine down a little more. Also, my old pool pump was dying when I replaced.

Also see http://swimming.about.com/od/poolandspa ... p_size.htm
Hi Mike,
Congratulations on saving $30 per month. I would be happy with that much savings on my total bill.
The filter is clean. Run it about 6 hours a day at a very slow speed. But I will have to speed it up with more hours. I was trying to get some reduction in my bill, but nothing has changed.About ten pounds of pressure on the gage. 14000 gallon pool. I have solar electricity, not solar heating.
I am going to get the pump checked. Perhaps it is a flawed pump. You would think that the local people who installed this would at least attempt to figure out of the pump is flawed. He looked at the pump and the connections and simply said that the pump is working fine. It might be your system! HUH? I was livid with that remark and told him to his face that I am NOT HAPPY. He could not find out what was wrong and left. As he was waling out the door, he muttered that he was late for his next appointment! I complained to the company about this behavior and they put the local installer on notice in case there are more complaints.
I feel ripped off.
Steve
Never in the history of market day-traders’ has the obsession with so much massive, sophisticated, & powerful statistical machinery used by the brightest people on earth with such useless results.
mikep
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Post by mikep »

I run veerrrry slow. 15 PSI is my solar setting when I need to overcome the head to the roof for solar 6hr/day. When solar is off, I run it at 1-2 PSI.. trickle through the filter 16hr/day.

Pool has been fine.. no algae whatsoever. Just fed usual chlorine tablets and shock once in a while. I have a lot of trees that constantly drop stuff in the pool too.

You may have a defective pump. They say that baseline savings even if you run at same speed should be 30% power savings.
Try this experiment:
Record your overall house energy meter value before this.
Run 16hr/day at slow speed at 1-2PSI through the filter for a week.

For 14000 gallon pool, for 16 hr turnover, you need 14.58 GPM. Now I don't know what your system head resistance is.. I'm guessing ~20ft if no solar and you might need to experiment here. Try setting the pump to ~1000 RPM, according to the curve that should be about 250W power. If you get trickle through the filter it should be okay. At the same time the next week check the house meter and compare that to the daily use kWH as reported on your most recent bill. I guess the more expensive version allows you to program GPM, even better.

I'm curious why you get an alarm monitor if you run the water too slow through the filter. The water just has to pass through, it doesn't matter how fast it goes. Did they set that correctly for a variable speed pump? I do not have such an alarm. Maybe it is set for just a regular 1.5 HP pump, to report a problem if that is running slow (since it shouldn't change).. I dunno.

I missed that you said you had solar electricity. Another thing since you have that you might not see as much savings if you are down in the lowest tier already. Maybe the pump is running when you get the most solar output from your roof. Do you have net metering with your power co?

EDIT - Another thing is it wired correctly for 115V or 230V? I guess it would have to be.. but just another thought.

Good luck!
Last edited by mikep on Thu Jul 29, 2010 4:59 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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sschullo
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Post by sschullo »

mikep wrote:I run veerrrry slow. 15 PSI is my solar setting when I need to overcome the head to the roof for solar 6hr/day. When solar is off, I run it at 1-2 PSI.. trickle through the filter 16hr/day.

Pool has been fine.. no algae whatsoever. Just fed usual chlorine tablets and shock once in a while. I have a lot of trees that constantly drop stuff in the pool too.

You may have a defective pump. They say that baseline savings even if you run at same speed should be 30% power savings.
Try this experiment:
Record your overall house energy meter value before this.
Run 16hr/day at slow speed at 1-2PSI through the filter for a week.

For 14000 gallon pool, for 16 hr turnover, you need 14.58 GPM. Now I don't know what your system head resistance is.. I'm guessing ~20ft if no solar and you might need to experiment here. Try setting the pump to ~1000 RPM, according to the curve that should be about 250W power. If you get trickle through the filter it should be okay. At the same time the next week check the house meter and compare that to the daily use kWH as reported on your most recent bill. I guess the more expensive version allows you to program GPM, even better.

I'm curious why you get an alarm monitor if you run the water too slow through the filter. The water just has to pass through, it doesn't matter how fast it goes. Did they set that correctly for a variable speed pump? I do not have such an alarm. Maybe it is set for just a regular 1.5 HP pump, to report a problem if that is running slow (since it shouldn't change).. I dunno.

I missed that you said you had solar electricity. Another thing since you have that you might not see as much savings if you are down in the lowest tier already. Maybe the pump is running when you get the most solar output from your roof. Do you have net metering with your power co?

Good luck!
Sorry, I forgot to mention that I have a salt water pool with the Intelli chorine generator which has the flow rate monitor. Perhaps thats the reason after all. Salt water pools require a specific flow rate to generate chorine. Still, the tech support at the company, Pentair, or the local installer did not say that this was the reason that my power bill is not lower.

I asked the technician about the fact that I have solar power which could "hide" the reduction because I am already at Tier 1. He did not know. This guy was no help. I am getting more information from you, Mike, than the person who installed the pool! I must admit that I was angry in a quiet way, so he was probably defensive and stunned that one customer was NOT HAPPY!

I only got two months of net metering with the power company and thats when we were gone in May and we shut off the electric water heater. Of course, the electrical kitchen, AC and the washer drying are all off too. Thats when we noticed a drop in useage. But as soon as we got back, the useage went back up as before. I expected a similar drop when we installed the pump last Nov. In fact the next month our usage went up!

I will take a look at your recommendations. I was thinking along those lines too except perhaps something more drastic and risky, like shutting down the pump for a week!

Thanks,
Steve
Last edited by sschullo on Thu Jul 29, 2010 5:17 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Never in the history of market day-traders’ has the obsession with so much massive, sophisticated, & powerful statistical machinery used by the brightest people on earth with such useless results.
mikep
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Post by mikep »

Ahh .. the salt generator may be the culprit. I don't have a salt generator.. maybe you can bypass it for a day or two just to check it out.

Now.. how much power does the salt generator use? Agree you can't run as slow if the salt generator likes a certain flow rate. Maybe config to higher flow just when salt is on if you have the fancy control panel.

Google found this..more info.. http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/po ... 32062.html
Last edited by mikep on Thu Jul 29, 2010 5:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.
NateW
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Post by NateW »

The only way you can truely determine the savings of switching pumps is to monitor the pumps' power usage on an individual basis. This means installing something similar to this:

http://www.energyfederation.org/consume ... 5QodFBMupA

in the pump circuit. You would have to use this set-up with both the old pump for a while and then with the new pump. Perhaps a month each, when the pool is in use.

You really can not tell by just judging by your total electric bill.

--Nate
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sschullo
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Post by sschullo »

NateW wrote:The only way you can truely determine the savings of switching pumps is to monitor the pumps' power usage on an individual basis. This means installing something similar to this:

http://www.energyfederation.org/consume ... 5QodFBMupA

in the pump circuit. You would have to use this set-up with both the old pump for a while and then with the new pump. Perhaps a month each, when the pool is in use.

You really can not tell by just judging by your total electric bill.

--Nate
Thanks Nate, unfortunatly the old motor is gone. If I had my drothers, I sure want it back. It was a perfectly good pump.

But I could compare the pumps power useage to the specs in the manuel, just to find out if I have a flawed pump.
What you think?
Steve
Never in the history of market day-traders’ has the obsession with so much massive, sophisticated, & powerful statistical machinery used by the brightest people on earth with such useless results.
Topic Author
sschullo
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Post by sschullo »

mikep wrote:Ahh .. the salt generator may be the culprit. I don't have a salt generator.. maybe you can bypass it for a day or two just to check it out.

Now.. how much power does the salt generator use? Agree you can't run as slow if the salt generator likes a certain flow rate. Maybe config to higher flow just when salt is on if you have the fancy control panel.

Google found this..more info.. http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/po ... 32062.html
The company tech support suggested that I lower the speed until the red light came on and then increase the speed until the green light came back on. I did this for the last several months with no noticiable power reduction.
But it appears to be, for now, that the culprits are salt water flow requirements and solar electricity, both obscure the power reduction.
I know the company rep will deny this. Still, it will be an interesting conversation with them. Ill talk to them tomorrow.
Steve
Never in the history of market day-traders’ has the obsession with so much massive, sophisticated, & powerful statistical machinery used by the brightest people on earth with such useless results.
Valuethinker
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Post by Valuethinker »

sschullo wrote:
mikep wrote:Ahh .. the salt generator may be the culprit. I don't have a salt generator.. maybe you can bypass it for a day or two just to check it out.

Now.. how much power does the salt generator use? Agree you can't run as slow if the salt generator likes a certain flow rate. Maybe config to higher flow just when salt is on if you have the fancy control panel.

Google found this..more info.. http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/po ... 32062.html
The company tech support suggested that I lower the speed until the red light came on and then increase the speed until the green light came back on. I did this for the last several months with no noticiable power reduction.
But it appears to be, for now, that the culprits are salt water flow requirements and solar electricity, both obscure the power reduction.
I know the company rep will deny this. Still, it will be an interesting conversation with them. Ill talk to them tomorrow.
Steve
You need to meter the electricity of the specific device. You can get devices to do that (that attach to the line).

It's no use looking at household use as a whole.
heikejohn
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Post by heikejohn »

Try asking for advice on this forum, too:

http://www.troublefreepool.com/

Best place for all pool related questions!!!!
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sschullo
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Post by sschullo »

I talked to a tech support rep from Pentair. Surprisingly he understood the main point that since my power bill is already at tier 1, which is 13 cents a KWH due to the solar production, that the additional reduction from the pump may be obscured. But he referred me to an expert in the company. He even asked if I wanted my old pump back, which I said YES! But its too late for that.
Thanks heikejohn, but this forum has soooooooooooo many bright people from all walks of life. I wanted to discuss this with other pool owners not from the pros and reps from the pool businesses. I have gotten nowhere talking with those folks until I learned FROM HERE what the source of my problem. Thanks to Mike experience with his pool, now I am ready to talk with the pros.
Interesting, I read the same responses over the years from people who come here to find out about investing and they learn more from us non professionals than they do from the pros.
Thanks everybody,
Steve
Never in the history of market day-traders’ has the obsession with so much massive, sophisticated, & powerful statistical machinery used by the brightest people on earth with such useless results.
heikejohn
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Post by heikejohn »

sschullo wrote:Thanks heikejohn, but this forum has soooooooooooo many bright people from all walks of life. I wanted to discuss this with other pool owners not from the pros and reps from the pool businesses. Steve
That site is run by people who are sick and tired of getting the run-around from the Pool-People.
Pool owners helping other pool owners not to get "Pool-Stored"
Please check it out if you ever have problems with your pool chemistry, plumbing, Salt Water Generator, or need to learn the correlation between PH, CL, ALK, and CYA.
It has helped me to stay out of the pool store for the last 3 years, never having problems with my water, spending less than $25.00 per month on chemicals for a 12000 gal pool.
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sschullo
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Post by sschullo »

heikejohn wrote:
sschullo wrote:Thanks heikejohn, but this forum has soooooooooooo many bright people from all walks of life. I wanted to discuss this with other pool owners not from the pros and reps from the pool businesses. Steve
That site is run by people who are sick and tired of getting the run-around from the Pool-People.
Pool owners helping other pool owners not to get "Pool-Stored"
Please check it out if you ever have problems with your pool chemistry, plumbing, Salt Water Generator, or need to learn the correlation between PH, CL, ALK, and CYA.
It has helped me to stay out of the pool store for the last 3 years, never having problems with my water, spending less than $25.00 per month on chemicals for a 12000 gal pool.
Thanks,
Yes I have already posted on the troublefreepool site.
Steve
Never in the history of market day-traders’ has the obsession with so much massive, sophisticated, & powerful statistical machinery used by the brightest people on earth with such useless results.
epilnk
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Post by epilnk »

The other place to research this is the pool forum at gardenweb:
http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/pools/

We just put in a new salt water pool with an intelliflow pump and solar. No comparison data, obviously, but there were a couple of points I remember from my research. We chose the VS which appears to work better with solar than the higher end VF.

The consensus is that these pumps will definitely minimize energy costs on a new build. But there isn't always a lot of cost savings on a retrofit. A lot depends on your specs - pipe size, design, filtration, etc. Some good technical information (along with fractious arguing and sniping) can be found in this thread, "Users who replaced pump with IntelliFlo - saved as expected?":
http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/po ... 10840.html

Linda
MarkBarb
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Post by MarkBarb »

I switched from a 2hp pump to the Pentair Intelliflo variable speed pump. I set my pump to run at 20 gpm, the minimum for our heater. Comparing the rated power usage of the 2hp pump with the measured usage of the new pump (it tells me on my pool control panel), it looks like I'm saving a lot of energy with the pump. I'm very happy with it.

One thing that is obvious watching the panel is that watts/gallon of water moved drop significantly as your lower the flow rate. It's almost like a car. The faster you want the water to go, the more energy you have to use.
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Jim012
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Post by Jim012 »

heikejohn wrote:
sschullo wrote:Thanks heikejohn, but this forum has soooooooooooo many bright people from all walks of life. I wanted to discuss this with other pool owners not from the pros and reps from the pool businesses. Steve
That site is run by people who are sick and tired of getting the run-around from the Pool-People.
Pool owners helping other pool owners not to get "Pool-Stored"
Please check it out if you ever have problems with your pool supplies, plumbing, Salt Water Generator, or need to learn the correlation between PH, CL, ALK, and CYA.
It has helped me to stay out of the pool store for the last 3 years, never having problems with my water, spending less than $25.00 per month on chemicals for a 12000 gal pool.
I appreciate this about this site! I've been reading for a while but just finally joined... thanks for the un-biased comments everybody!
btenny
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Post by btenny »

Some buddies of mine built their own swimming pools back in the 1980s. One key feature was special plumbing to reduce motor size and energy use. They did some analyis of the water flow and how much HP was need to move the water. They put in big diameter pipe and ultra WIDE radius pipe around the corners and turns to reduce the necessary HP to move the water. They ended up with 15,000 gal pools cleaned well using only 1/2 HP motor versus other designs that used 1-1.5 HP motors. There only tough issue was finding a plumber to do this "funny piping" and getting a pool filter that worked well with low working pressure.

I suspect some of you may have pipe flow issues with these special new motors as well.

Bill
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