Can I Use A Tankless Water Heater For Hydronic Heating

Designed as whole house alternatives to traditional tank type water heaters or for use as supplements to renewable energy systems including solar and geothermal.

Can i use a tankless water heater for hydronic heating. If you don t want to use a boiler you may be able to use a tank style water heater but only in some jurisdictions since using a water heater as a boiler may be a code violation. Make sure you invest in a high efficiency tankless water heater. Matter of fact quite a few plumbing companies install them either hydronic only or combo units using a heat exchanger. Water heater for radiant heat water heaters are good for radiant floor heating because they maintain a low temperature.

They function similar to the muchkins and copper fin boilers you might be able to pay for two tankless v s one 90 boiler of the same btu rating. He said their hydronic air handlers are designed to work with their water heaters. I recently spoke with a rinnai engineer about this noting that rinnai also sells combi boilers for space heat and dhw. Click here to download free schematic plans and to watch a video on how to make it happen.

And i would never recommend the use of a tankless water heater for a hydronic space heating system. You actually have a choice between them as you can use a water heater or tankless for radiant floor heating and not just a boiler. Can you use a hot water tank for infloor hydronic heating or hot water radiators. However it is important to understand that not all of them are suitable for this task.

Tankless heater allowed per code we are allowed to use a tankless heater in this application per our building code. Tankless water heater can be used to produce radiant heating. That said it is a cheap btu. 1 100 for the tankless heater 1 400 for the pex tubing and 2 400 for the various components controls and fittings.

For even greater savings it s possible to install a solar thermal system that will allow the sun to do some of the water heating work. This is especially true when a high efficiency tankless water heater is used as the main hot water source. You really only need a maximum of 120 f for your floor. A well designed hydronic heating system can be very economical in terms of energy use.

What you can t do is use a tankless water heater in a closed loop application. The economics of using a tankless water heater to supply both dhw and heating are also quite attractive. However that wasn t the question. If you use a tankless as a boiler the warranty will drop drastically from about 10 years on the heat exchanger to 3.