Solar Water Heating: A Comprehensive Guide to Solar Water and Space Heating Systems (Mother Earth News Wiser Living Series)

• The Renewable Energy Handbook: A Guide to Rural Energy Independence, Off-Grid and Sustainable Living
• The Homeowner's Guide to Renewable Energy: Achieving Energy Independence through Solar, Wind, Biomass and Hydropower (Mother Earth News Wiser Living)
• Photovoltaics: Design and Installation Manual
• Got Sun? Go Solar: Get Free Renewable Energy to Power Your Grid-Tied Home
• The Solar House: Passive Heating and Cooling

Heating water with the sun is almost as old as humankind itself, and it is done all over the world. Yet there are strangely few resources on the topic in North America.

Solar Water Heating fills this gap. It reviews the history of solar water and space heating systems from prehistory to the present, then presents the basics of solar water heating, including an introduction to modern solar energy systems, energy conservation and energy economics. Drawing on the author's experience as an installer of these systems, the book goes on to cover:

• Types of solar collectors, solar water and space heating systems and solar pool heating systems, including their advantages and disadvantages
• System components, their installation, operation, and maintenance
• System sizing and siting
• Choosing the appropriate system.

Since people often get turned off by the up-front cost, the book focuses especially on the financial aspects of solar water or space heating systems, clearly showing that such systems can save significant costs in the long run. Well-illustrated, the book is designed for a wide readership from the curious to the student or professional.

Bob Ramlow is the solar thermal consultant for the Wisconsin Focus on Energy Program. The owner of a renewable energy company, he has over 30 years experience with solar energy systems and is a founder and director of the Midwest Renewable Energy Association (MREA). Benjamin Nusz currently works as a solar water heating consultant and site assessor in Wisconsin.

I don't know a heck of a lot about solar technologies. But after reading just the first few chapters I feel confident enough to build a simple flat panel solar water heater.

But people with a handy man ability or a bit more like myself (builder)can figure things out pretty easily. After reading reviews for this book I made the purchase hoping to have the basics of solar water heating covered. The book does that very well. Over All an excellent resource. Like most of us I'd love to see a book covering a detailed step by step installation with tools, equipment, costs, etc.

This is a very well written book. Build Your Own Solar Heating System Bob Ramlow has done a lot of work on the subject of solar heating and makes the subject fun to read. I highly recommend that if you are interested in solar heating you also read "Build Your Own Solar Heating System" by Kenneth Clive.

My only real disappointment is the pervasive use of non-metric units (btu/therms, feet, gallons) throughout the book. Contains all the rules of thumbs and all the subjects really you need to know (system components, scaling of the system, types of solar water heating systems, system maintenance, system installation, cost calculations, etc). would have been a useful addition. Also a decision diagram/tree for helping to decide what type of solar heating system you would best go for depending on your climate/freezing conditions or not, etc. Very good and useful book if you want to understand/evaluate offers/tenders of companies that will construct your solar water heating system. This makes it hard to read for non-American readers. This information, though, is in the text, but you just have to read it all. There is a unit conversion table, but it would have been better to include the second unit system between brackets or just to use the international metric system.

This book has inspired me to design into the cabin solar hot water for household and radiant use. The author has extensive experience in the area of solar heating of water and conveys that knowledge to the reader very effectively. This book is practical and written in a very easy to understand manner. This book goes beyond hot water for household use and into radiant heating with the use of a heat storage system using a large sand bed which is the GEM of the book. Now if I could just find a decent book about radiant heating for less than $100. I am planning on building a cabin in the Colorado Mtns and wanted this retreat to be self-sustaining and not a warm cabin that was sucking power or energy while not in use.