If you're interested in using the sun to heat your swimming pool, you've come to the right place!
Learn how Solar Thermal works, if it's right for you, how to pay for it, tips for hiring contractors and more. If you're ready to buy a solar pool heating system, you can go directly to our list of local installers.
What is Solar Thermal?
Solar Thermal describes systems that convert the suns energy to heat that can be used to offset loads typically provided by natural gas and electricity. Solar Thermal systems are therefore different from photovoltaic ( PV) systems that convert the sun’s energy into electricity. In most households, the energy usage is more or less split between thermal energy and electrical energy making Solar Thermal and Solar Electric ( PV) systems suitable for use.
Solar Thermal systems come in a wide variety of types suitable for the uses they are put to. Low temperature applications such as swimming pools usually use unglazed polypropylene collectors while higher temperature systems such as domestic water heating use highly insulated collectors fabricated from copper. These two uses: swimming pools and domestic hot water, constitute the vast majority of Solar Thermal systems installed in the United States and will be the focus here. Other uses such as home space heating and industrial process heat are also possible and are briefly discussed in the section titled ‘other uses’.
