Getting ready to commit to geothermal

[BethW]

After a winter of astronomical oil bills even with the thermostat at 60°, we're waving goodbye to our 50 year old furnace. Geothermal seems to be the way to go, especially as our only other options are oil or propane. We have an 1843 farmhouse, so a heat pump isn't going to keep us warm, even though the house is fairly well insulated.

Anyone have geothermal or know enough to share any caveats? Besides the high initial cost (which is starting to come down) there doesn't seem to be any real pitfalls to this kind of system.

[SolarGary]

Hi,
As an alternative to the GSHP, I'd consider installing a new efficient furnace and then using some of the extra money you would have put into the GSHP into improving the thermal efficiency of the house: more insulation, tighter sealing, new windows or window treatments. And, if you have the sun exposure consider some form of solar water and/or space heating -- this might include an attached sunspace, which gives more living space and some solar heat for the house.
Ideas here: www.BuildItSolar.com

All of these things together will probably lower your heat bills by at least as much as the GSHP. They will lower CO2 emissions quite a bit more than the GSHP.

If you do go the GSHP route, be sure that you get a good contractor and get and call his/her references. They are complex systems that need to be designed and installed carefully -- a lot of these systems just don't live up to customer expectations because of inadequate loop lengths or wrong sized heat pumps or other things.

All that said, some people are quite satisfied with GSHP systems, and if you get a good installation, you might be also.

Gary