expiredTnnyynn posted Feb 04, 2025 01:43 AM
Item 1 of 2
Item 1 of 2
expiredTnnyynn posted Feb 04, 2025 01:43 AM
Rheem ProTerra 50 Gal. Hybrid Heat Pump Smart Electric Water Heater
& More + Free Ship to Store$1,487
$1,859
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Federal requirements for resistance water heater production was changed several years ago making any water heater over 55 gallons required to be a hybrid. Some older units have not sold, we even found a couple of old marathons a couple years ago. Both failed after 3 years, rheem rep stated something to do with the units being over 10 years old with the plastic being submitted to freezing temperatures in the warehouse. Luckily for the customer we covered handled all the warranty, Rheem initially said warranty was off the manufacturer date, but when we pushed back they offered a standard tank and we ate the warranty. There was also an exception for light duty commercial units which some plumbers have put in residential settings.
Longevity and reliablity are interesting. There are multiple tiers of HPWHs, such as the tier 1 geosprings from back in the day, to the new tier 4 units like the ProTerra. Higher tier units have a lower sound rating while running, and a sealed compressor. The failure rate is so much lower on the sealed units they just swap out the whole heater if it fails within the 10 year warranty that HPWHs have. In the tier 1 days, the moving parts of the HPWHs with their brand new tech made them louder and fail fairly often. The new units have been alright, still some failures as mentioned in the thread.
A big but here, the standard resistance water heaters have changed alot lately. They have cheaped out on the elements. We continue to see the element corrode fairly quickly even with only mild water quality issues. When the element does this, it grounds out, and the water heater runs in a semi simultaneous mode, with the top element pulling its 240 volts when it calls for heat, and the bottom element constantly pulling 120 grounding through the heater. Best case scenario with these have been the high limit switch popping if the heater is not used much. If the heater is used, the water never gets to 150 degrees. Several heaters have caught on fire, due to the manufacturers cheaping out using 12 gauge wire in the water heater while most homes, at least in my area, have 10 gauge house wire with a 30-amp circuit. The current of both elements running exceeds the ampacity of the 12 gauge wire, and over time, the insulation cooks where the two legs are next to each other in the top connection junction box.
I've seen this multiple times, with multiple brands, I've used a clamp meter to show my guys, and the reps what is happening, because before they blamed it on the house electrical, and the electrician blamed it on poor connections in the box.
We've starting doing yearly inspections on water heaters and look for water being too hot, or see wear or black marks on the wires in the junction box. So far the fires have been contained inside these junction boxes.
Also on reliability, the new resistance water heaters are being required to have control panels now, to allow the future control of your heater by the power company. In the last month, 7 of our Bradford White heaters have failed due to the control panels. We've had to take panels out of new units as replacements are not available from BW yet. So problems with units are not isolated to HPWHs.
Cost savings on a hybrid HPWH is up to 70%. Depending on power cost, that adds up to a bit. Portland General Electric is charging 20.89 cents per KWH. Average family of 4 in our area will save over $7,000 after 10 years. This math takes into account the increased cost of the HPWH and installation, as well as local and federal rebates/credits. Savings will be less depending on where you live. But even our Washington folks with 8 cents per KWH save over $3,000.
Ducting and cold: In a properly sized room, it does cool it a bit. Your HVAC system works harder in the winter, and works less in the summer. You can set the units to run in resistance in the winter, if you like, but I agree your whole house heater is more efficient than a resistance water heater on average. For this reason we generally do not duct outside, as that takes away the customers option to get the free cooling in the summer. Also, a HPWH runs with resistance only below around 41 degrees, so it's not like they are saving by ducting to the outside anyway.
But if a room is to small, we will run 2x 5" ducts out. One to pull air in, and one to exhaust cold air back out. This makes the unit run similar to a direct vent gas water heater, and it does not affect the house thermal envelope at all. Again, with this no summer savings on house cooling, and the HPWH is running resistance all winter up here, even where it is colder, we like to pull from the inside.
Others will have different opinions, but i figured I'd give feedback from a plumber who actually deals with them. **Cue old school plumber who hates anything new like HPWHs, but installs CPVC pipe because it's cheap
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If you're in a cooling climate where your A/C runs for 8+ months, a HPWH like this starts to make a lot of sense.
Edit Feb 10, 2025: I did some math for my situation, and believe a HPWH might save in the ballpark of about ~$5/mo on your A/C bills during cooling months and add ~$5/mo to your heat bills (depending on your heat source). However, having the HPWH will save you about 200kWh/mo on electricity, which is about $25/mo (ranges from $12-$50+). Of course all of these things scale with your hot water usage and energy costs.
The installers called Rheem and apparently there were a lot of units sent out with poorly programmed control panels. So a new one was on the way.
I asked and the installer said there would be another charge if I wanted them to install it. I work electronics, so I was confident that I could install whatever came in. Around two weeks later the control panel arrived. No instructions, but a YouTube video later and it didn't look complicated.
Long story short. You may get a faulty unit. Call and get a new control panel shipped to you (no way to flash them apparently). The install of the new board is just connectors and blade contacts. Take a picture before and plug everything in where it needs to go. This wouldn't prevent me from buying again.
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Federal requirements for resistance water heater production was changed several years ago making any water heater over 55 gallons required to be a hybrid. Some older units have not sold, we even found a couple of old marathons a couple years ago. Both failed after 3 years, rheem rep stated something to do with the units being over 10 years old with the plastic being submitted to freezing temperatures in the warehouse. Luckily for the customer we covered handled all the warranty, Rheem initially said warranty was off the manufacturer date, but when we pushed back they offered a standard tank and we ate the warranty. There was also an exception for light duty commercial units which some plumbers have put in residential settings.
Longevity and reliablity are interesting. There are multiple tiers of HPWHs, such as the tier 1 geosprings from back in the day, to the new tier 4 units like the ProTerra. Higher tier units have a lower sound rating while running, and a sealed compressor. The failure rate is so much lower on the sealed units they just swap out the whole heater if it fails within the 10 year warranty that HPWHs have. In the tier 1 days, the moving parts of the HPWHs with their brand new tech made them louder and fail fairly often. The new units have been alright, still some failures as mentioned in the thread.
A big but here, the standard resistance water heaters have changed alot lately. They have cheaped out on the elements. We continue to see the element corrode fairly quickly even with only mild water quality issues. When the element does this, it grounds out, and the water heater runs in a semi simultaneous mode, with the top element pulling its 240 volts when it calls for heat, and the bottom element constantly pulling 120 grounding through the heater. Best case scenario with these have been the high limit switch popping if the heater is not used much. If the heater is used, the water never gets to 150 degrees. Several heaters have caught on fire, due to the manufacturers cheaping out using 12 gauge wire in the water heater while most homes, at least in my area, have 10 gauge house wire with a 30-amp circuit. The current of both elements running exceeds the ampacity of the 12 gauge wire, and over time, the insulation cooks where the two legs are next to each other in the top connection junction box.
I've seen this multiple times, with multiple brands, I've used a clamp meter to show my guys, and the reps what is happening, because before they blamed it on the house electrical, and the electrician blamed it on poor connections in the box.
We've starting doing yearly inspections on water heaters and look for water being too hot, or see wear or black marks on the wires in the junction box. So far the fires have been contained inside these junction boxes.
Also on reliability, the new resistance water heaters are being required to have control panels now, to allow the future control of your heater by the power company. In the last month, 7 of our Bradford White heaters have failed due to the control panels. We've had to take panels out of new units as replacements are not available from BW yet. So problems with units are not isolated to HPWHs.
Cost savings on a hybrid HPWH is up to 70%. Depending on power cost, that adds up to a bit. Portland General Electric is charging 20.89 cents per KWH. Average family of 4 in our area will save over $7,000 after 10 years. This math takes into account the increased cost of the HPWH and installation, as well as local and federal rebates/credits. Savings will be less depending on where you live. But even our Washington folks with 8 cents per KWH save over $3,000.
Ducting and cold: In a properly sized room, it does cool it a bit. Your HVAC system works harder in the winter, and works less in the summer. You can set the units to run in resistance in the winter, if you like, but I agree your whole house heater is more efficient than a resistance water heater on average. For this reason we generally do not duct outside, as that takes away the customers option to get the free cooling in the summer. Also, a HPWH runs with resistance only below around 41 degrees, so it's not like they are saving by ducting to the outside anyway.
But if a room is to small, we will run 2x 5" ducts out. One to pull air in, and one to exhaust cold air back out. This makes the unit run similar to a direct vent gas water heater, and it does not affect the house thermal envelope at all. Again, with this no summer savings on house cooling, and the HPWH is running resistance all winter up here, even where it is colder, we like to pull from the inside.
Others will have different opinions, but i figured I'd give feedback from a plumber who actually deals with them. **Cue old school plumber who hates anything new like HPWHs, but installs CPVC pipe because it's cheap
Obviously, if you're between this and a gas unit, and gas is cheap, you have some math to do. But to assert that this isn't better than a resistive electric unit during a cold winter is just inaccurate, unless you've got your water heater outside or something wild. You absolutely will save on energy throughout the year over a resistive unit.
We have ours set to eco mode and the resistive unit never comes on for heat. If we have visitors I'll take it off of eco just to be sure we don't run out of water. Three years and counting and we've more than saved the cost of the unit in energy at this point.
Electric water heater at $0.12/kWh is $396/year
Electric water heater at $0.06/kWh is $198/year (utilizing time-of-use)
Heat pump water heater at $0.12/kWh is $107/year
Heat pump water heater at $0.06/kWh is $53/year (utilizing time-of-use, if this situation provides you with enough hot water??)
I can calculate how much this affects my heating and cooling bills.
- Heat energy transferred into hot water using Q=MCT: 50gal/day = 8.76 therm/mo
- Energy used by heat pump at 50gal/day = 2.52 therm/mo or 74kWh/mo
- Extra heating cost in winter with gas: 8.76 therm to replace - 2.52 therm produced by heat pump = 6.24 therm * $0.715/therm = $4.46/mo extra.
- Savings on cooling in the summer: 8.76 therm cooled - 2.52 therm produced by heat pump = 6.24 therm. 6.24 therm * 100 / 13 SEER = 48kWh saved * $0.12/kWh = $5.76/mo saved
- Savings on electric bill: 95% efficient vs 350% efficient means the HPWH will use 27% of an electric heater. Electric is 275 kWh/mo vs HPWH 75kWh/mo, so you're saving 200kWh/mo. at $0.12/kWh this is $24/mo saved.
Utilizing time-of-use rates in a cold climate:
For 50gal/day 4mo A/C, 7mo Heat at $0.06/kWh and $0.715/therm: ((200kWh * 12mo) + (48kWh * 4mo)) * $0.06/kWh - (6.24therm * 7mo) * $0.715/therm = $124 saved per year over electric.
Normal rates in more normal US climate:
For 50gal/day 8mo A/C, 3mo Heat at $0.12/kWh and $0.715/therm: ((200kWh * 12mo) + (48kWh * 8mo)) * $0.12/kWh - (6.24therm * 3mo) * $0.715/therm = $320 saved per year over electric.
Southern California rates/climate:
For 50gal/day 10mo A/C, 0mo Heat at $0.22/kWh and $0.715/therm: ((200kWh * 12mo) + (48kWh * 10mo)) * $0.22/kWh - (6.24therm * 0mo) * $0.715/therm = $633 saved per year over electric.
My takeaways:
- A heat pump water heater will probably only bump your heating or A/C bills by about $5/month
- A heat pump water heater can easily save you $25/mo+ over baseline
- One should consider switching to time-of-use if they have a large enough electric water heater to store a day's worth of hot water. This can get you halfway towards the savings of a heat pump water heater.
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Federal requirements for resistance water heater production was changed several years ago making any water heater over 55 gallons required to be a hybrid. Some older units have not sold, we even found a couple of old marathons a couple years ago. Both failed after 3 years, rheem rep stated something to do with the units being over 10 years old with the plastic being submitted to freezing temperatures in the warehouse. Luckily for the customer we covered handled all the warranty, Rheem initially said warranty was off the manufacturer date, but when we pushed back they offered a standard tank and we ate the warranty. There was also an exception for light duty commercial units which some plumbers have put in residential settings.
Longevity and reliablity are interesting. There are multiple tiers of HPWHs, such as the tier 1 geosprings from back in the day, to the new tier 4 units like the ProTerra. Higher tier units have a lower sound rating while running, and a sealed compressor. The failure rate is so much lower on the sealed units they just swap out the whole heater if it fails within the 10 year warranty that HPWHs have. In the tier 1 days, the moving parts of the HPWHs with their brand new tech made them louder and fail fairly often. The new units have been alright, still some failures as mentioned in the thread.
A big but here, the standard resistance water heaters have changed alot lately. They have cheaped out on the elements. We continue to see the element corrode fairly quickly even with only mild water quality issues. When the element does this, it grounds out, and the water heater runs in a semi simultaneous mode, with the top element pulling its 240 volts when it calls for heat, and the bottom element constantly pulling 120 grounding through the heater. Best case scenario with these have been the high limit switch popping if the heater is not used much. If the heater is used, the water never gets to 150 degrees. Several heaters have caught on fire, due to the manufacturers cheaping out using 12 gauge wire in the water heater while most homes, at least in my area, have 10 gauge house wire with a 30-amp circuit. The current of both elements running exceeds the ampacity of the 12 gauge wire, and over time, the insulation cooks where the two legs are next to each other in the top connection junction box.
I've seen this multiple times, with multiple brands, I've used a clamp meter to show my guys, and the reps what is happening, because before they blamed it on the house electrical, and the electrician blamed it on poor connections in the box.
We've starting doing yearly inspections on water heaters and look for water being too hot, or see wear or black marks on the wires in the junction box. So far the fires have been contained inside these junction boxes.
Also on reliability, the new resistance water heaters are being required to have control panels now, to allow the future control of your heater by the power company. In the last month, 7 of our Bradford White heaters have failed due to the control panels. We've had to take panels out of new units as replacements are not available from BW yet. So problems with units are not isolated to HPWHs.
Cost savings on a hybrid HPWH is up to 70%. Depending on power cost, that adds up to a bit. Portland General Electric is charging 20.89 cents per KWH. Average family of 4 in our area will save over $7,000 after 10 years. This math takes into account the increased cost of the HPWH and installation, as well as local and federal rebates/credits. Savings will be less depending on where you live. But even our Washington folks with 8 cents per KWH save over $3,000.
Ducting and cold: In a properly sized room, it does cool it a bit. Your HVAC system works harder in the winter, and works less in the summer. You can set the units to run in resistance in the winter, if you like, but I agree your whole house heater is more efficient than a resistance water heater on average. For this reason we generally do not duct outside, as that takes away the customers option to get the free cooling in the summer. Also, a HPWH runs with resistance only below around 41 degrees, so it's not like they are saving by ducting to the outside anyway.
But if a room is to small, we will run 2x 5" ducts out. One to pull air in, and one to exhaust cold air back out. This makes the unit run similar to a direct vent gas water heater, and it does not affect the house thermal envelope at all. Again, with this no summer savings on house cooling, and the HPWH is running resistance all winter up here, even where it is colder, we like to pull from the inside.
Others will have different opinions, but i figured I'd give feedback from a plumber who actually deals with them. **Cue old school plumber who hates anything new like HPWHs, but installs CPVC pipe because it's cheap
We live in a year round hot, humid climate. The cost per kWh is about .35/per
I want to be able to run this on my Ecoflow ultra in case of emergencies but using 4kwh to have hot water is not good use of the battery.
Question:
How many watts is this thing really pulling for a 2 person home on a daily basis?
I think it would only be worth it to change it if our 4-5kwh consumption dropped down to 1-2kwh per day.
We can use $0.2089 per KWH if you prefer.
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