Weather in Delaware, is geothermal heat enough?

What kind of weather does Delaware have, and is geothermal heat with nothing else enough?

I have friends who moved to Delaware 6 years ago, and she complains that it almost never gets hot in the summer. It's almost always cold and wet. (I thought the weather was like Baltimore, which has plenty of warm days and hot days.)

I'm thinking it's not so bad if it's cold and wet outside, if it's warm enough inside. Not only is it not so bad, but it if it's cold inside because geothermal isn't enough, it's will make it seem like it's cold and wet outside a lot more than it really is. (Even if someone goes out every day????)

I was there on Sunday, and it was sort of cold in the house and out.

Does geothermal put out enough heat to make most people comfortable?

Reply to
mm
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Not true. I live in Delaware and summers can be brutally hot with high humidity. Don't know how I survived as a kid without air conditioning. You were correct in assuming that weather is like Baltimore's.

Geothermal should work for heat. I know of only one guy that has it and I assume he's happy.

Reply to
Frank

On 4/22/2011 5:53 PM, mm wrote: ...

Like any other furnace system, it has to be properly sized.

Had geothermal in E TN which is unlikely to be much different in being much warmer than DE (reached -24F in K-town while we were there and near zero at least a time or two a year is pretty much normal) and it was most marvelous. It has the facility to have exit temperatures that, while not those of combustion forced air or resistance heat systems, exceeds those of air exchange units and is toasty to the toes.

Again, sizing and proper installation are mandatory...undersize a conventional furnace and one can be cold.

Of course, the friend may simply have (and be used to having) the thermostat far cooler than you're used to... :)

OBTW, while the system did have resistance "emergency" heat, they were installed w/ a thermistor interlock to prevent them from operating at any time the air temp was >15F. We didn't have the system yet on the

-24F day, but in the 6-7 years had the unit (before moving) I pretty certain that the backup heat never kicked in.

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Reply to
dpb

Yes, it is. I know people in Ontario that have nothing but geothermal. Properly installed and sized, it is sufficient.

I've been in Delaware plenty of times from north to south. It can get very hot there in summer, but if you are from Saudi Arabia, it may be cool to you. I've seen 90's plenty of times.

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Reply to
Ed Pawlowski

Reply to
Big Jim

What kind of weather does Delaware have, and is geothermal heat with nothing else enough?

I have friends who moved to Delaware 6 years ago, and she complains that it almost never gets hot in the summer. It's almost always cold and wet. (I thought the weather was like Baltimore, which has plenty of warm days and hot days.)

I'm thinking it's not so bad if it's cold and wet outside, if it's warm enough inside. Not only is it not so bad, but it if it's cold inside because geothermal isn't enough, it's will make it seem like it's cold and wet outside a lot more than it really is. (Even if someone goes out every day????)

I was there on Sunday, and it was sort of cold in the house and out.

Does geothermal put out enough heat to make most people comfortable? ====================

Where'd she live before, Death Valley? Like Frank, I too grew up there with no a/c. I don't know if it's because I've lived in more northern states since then, but when I went back to visit a couple summers ago my mother's a/c broke. I was completely miserable, my face turned red just sitting in the LR under the ceiling fan, lower level of a big house. I was frustrated too, because I couldn't even hold my new baby nephews - it was just too hot to touch anyone. In WI we sometimes get 100°F+ days, but it's fairly dry. 80-90% humidity is common in DE. Looking at the average summer temps in Florida, many days in DE compare unfavorably.

Still, family's family, and I'm thinking of moving back there. Was looking at a house with a damaged in-ground pool up in Dunlinden. I was wondering whether having that hole in the ground might lessen the expense of putting in geothermal. That's what I'd want to do.

Reply to
Nelly

Well, it's strange what she told me, but my question here made it a little stranger. I was talking about being cold in April and wondering if she wasn't cold in the winter for lack of heat, when as I said, she was complaining about being cold in the summer.

I made it worse by thinking she was huddled cold in her house in the summer, not quite realizing how warm it was outside, because she had inadequate heat, which would be ridiculous. She would have to have too much AC and it does have a thermostat, so even if there were more than needed, it would turn off and not be too much.

So since you all agree it's warm and hot there in the summer, I don't know what is giving her the other idea. Maybe it rains a lot and that makes her think it's cold.

She's even talking about moving back to Brooklyn, NY. (As opposed to Brooklyn, Baltimore), which would be good for me, since then I"d have a place to stay in Brooklyn, instead of Delaware, but I am not putting my desires first. :-) They used to live in a big old house on Staten Island.

It wasn't hot anywhere around here the particular April day I was there.

Again, I thought it rained in Delaware a lot like it rained in Baltimore.

The first summer here that was an awful lot, but it still didn't make me think it was cold here. The grass has to be mowed up to November iirc. I think it was late September in Indiana.

Thanks anyhow. I'll see what they do.

Reply to
mm

mm wrote the following:

It depends upon what part of DE they lived. My parents lived in SE DE for decades. I visited at all times of the year. They lived near the MD border and were about 15 minutes from Ocean City, MD. Their boat dock was on the Little Assawoman Bay (yes, that's the name) :-) Because they lived close to the ocean, and DE is as flat as a pool table, the temps were always more moderate than interior sections due to ocean winds.

Reply to
willshak

I should have said, Dover, just a mile west of Dover AFB, right on the same river that according to Google maps is called Moores Lake a half mile to the west.

They have a great location, a great lot. They shopped for months. One reason I'd hate to see them move.

Reply to
mm

Oh, it's the St. Jones/Joan's River. We had joked about this since I heard joenz and thought Jones and said I'd never heard of St. Jones, and I thought he said it was really St. Joan, who I had heard of.

But on Google maps I found not too far away St. Jones River Greenway. So who the heck was St. Jones, and was that his first name or last name.

Wikip "The river is believed to have been named either for Robert Jones, an early European property owner in the region, or for "St. Jone", the Welsh spelling of St. John.[1]"

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Reply to
mm

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