![\"Off](\"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/off-peak-hw.jpg\")
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Last week Finn got me into hot water.\u00a0 He did this by referring me to a study called::<\/p>\r\n
\r\n“Analysis of electricity consumption and thermal storage of domestic electric water heating systems to utilize excess PV generation”<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n
Let me translate that from Academeze into English for you:<\/p>\r\n
\r\nAre electric hot water systems any good at soaking up excess solar electricity?<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n
Here are some of the findings:<\/p>\r\n
\r\n
- Electric hot water systems average 25% of a home’s electricity use. That surprised me. It’s more than previous estimates I’d seen.<\/li>\r\n
- If heat pump systems are ignored and only conventional electric hot water systems are considered, electric hot water averages 25% of a home’s electricity use.<\/li>\r\n
- Electric hot water can act as a battery, storing energy from rooftop solar panels for later use.<\/li>\r\n
- Even when no effort is made to increase solar electricity consumption, lots of the energy consumed by electric hot water systems can come from rooftop solar power.<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n
The last point suggests that it may be cheaper for some households with solar panels to have their hot water systems on their regular tariff:<\/p>\r\n
\r\n
- even if a controlled load is available,<\/li>\r\n
- even if the home’s solar system is relatively small,<\/li>\r\n
- and even if they make no effort to control the hot water to match solar electricity generation. \u00a0<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n
After reading the study<\/a> I was shocked at how little we know about Australian hot water energy consumption.\u00a0 I’m not saying we should spend a lot of money investigating this, but if the boffins at\u00a0ANTSO<\/a> get over $300 million a year, surely we can spare a little to look into the appliances that make up a quarter of residential energy use1<\/a><\/sup>.<\/p>\r\n
In this article, I’ll tell you all the other interesting things I now know about Australian electric hot water, including the study’s main discoveries.<\/p>\r\n
The Study Is Paywalled<\/h2>\r\n
Update October 26th 2021:\u00a0 <\/strong>Paul in the comments has kindly pointed out the study can be viewed online for free<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\r\n
The study is by Yildiz, Bilbao, Roberts, Heslop, Dore, Bruce2<\/a><\/sup>, MacGill, Egan, and Sproul.\u00a0 If you want to read it, I’m afraid it’s paywalled.\u00a0 If you’re not a university student, you’ll likely have to shell out money to Elsivier — an organisation that pays people who write papers nothing but charges others to read them.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n
The most positive thing I can say about that is, it’s good work if you can get it.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n
But if you want to read a science paper without paying for it, you can just pick whichever of the authors appears lowest on the academic pecking list based on how many letters they have after their name and send them an email saying:<\/p>\r\n
\r\n“Dear [NAME], your paper [NAME OF PAPER] was recommended to me by [RANDOM NAME].\u00a0 I would be very grateful if you could send me a copy of either it or an earlier draft.\u00a0 I promise not to use the information for evil<\/a>.”\u00a0<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n
You’d be surprised how often that works.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n