Subject: A cure for a damp basement?

From: [email-masked] (Nick Pine)
Date: 31 Aug 1996 11:05:12 -0400

Bill Shurcliff wrote (in December, 1980, in "Solar Flashes," the newsletter
of Colorado's Alternative and Solar Energy Associations)...

It seems to me a crying shame not to make use of the thermal capacity of a
concrete basement. The house proper weighs, say 15 tons, and the concrete
basement (concrete floor, concrete walls) weighs about 60 tons. Tremendous!

[60x2000x0.16 = 19K Btu/F, like 40 55 gallon drums full of water?...]

One idea is to heat all this up to about 100 F; thus it stores much heat, and
this heat can be used at night, or next cloudy day, to warm the rooms. An idea
that appeals to me is to use a low-cost, informal, air-type solar collector
to heat the basement to 60 of 70 F, then use a COP-3 GE 10,000 Btu/hr air
conditioner (new type costing about $500 or $600) to transfer heat from the
basement air to the room air; the rooms are kept warm, and the basement air
gets colder and colder--until the next sunny day, when solar energy heats the
basement up again to about 70 F. The air conditioner is mounted in the floor
between the central hall and the basement below; it steadily "tries to cool"
the basement, while using the main story (central hall) as a heat sink.

Note that the basement, being no hotter than about 70 F, does not lose much
heat to the outdoors (the basement is insulated on the exterior, of course.)
Also note that, inasmuch as the solar air-type collector is called upon to
deliver air that is only at about 70 or 80 F, the collector can be merely
single-glazed and of very flimsy, cheap type--say a long plastic contraption
draped along the entire south wall of the house, below window level; ie a
"drape" 4 ft. high and 36 ft. long, say, with a small blower and flexible
duct, circulating basement air into the collector and back into the basement.

Note also that the basement, being usually at about 60 or 70 F, is eminently
habitable (for workroom, playroom, bedroom, or whatever.) Note, finally, that
the air conditioner can be relocated and reassigned in summer to act as a
normal cooler, to keep all of the rooms cool. (I assume that the house is
superinsulated, so that even a modest amount of cooling will suffice to keep
the entire house cool.)

...

My house has a dirt basement floor, with stone walls, with insulation outside
of the stone, and it's often quite damp. I've been thinking of adding a vapor
barrier, but Norman Saunders says the main mechanism for upward heatflow in
the ground is evaporation of water, with condensation above... This seems
like a nice inexpensive high-performance heat pump, using equipment that many
people already own, with a good 55 F heat source even in the dead of winter. 

Nick

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From: [email-masked] (Brian Helfrich and Lynn Wigglesworth)
Date: 1 Sep 1996 20:51:29 GMT

Nick Pine ([email-masked]) wrote:

[snip]

> Nick

The house we are buying has the same kind of basement. In addition, it 
has a pipe with spring water flowing (we think it was the original house 
water--before the well was added). The water is always cold (even in mid 
summer) and I've been trying to think of some way to use the cold water 
before sending it on it's way out of the basement. I don't know if it's 
drinkable, but I thought of somehow cooling a box (a beer cooler? storage 
for extra veggies or eggs?) with it, then directing it out of the 
basement. It's a shame to waste such nice coldness. Any ideas?

regards,

Lynn

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From: "Judith A. Clegg" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 04 Sep 1996 05:27:10 -0700

Lynn,

> basement. It's a shame to waste such nice coldness. Any ideas?

I don't know about ways to use it as 'cold' water, but my aunt and uncle 
have two spigots for their kitchen sink.  One delivers well water, which they 
prefer to drink, and the second delivers city water so that they don't have 
the mineral problems in their pipes.  They also have a storage tank that 
collects rain water, and that is hooked up to their washing machine.  My 
aunt says that you don't need fabric softener.  Do have the spring water 
checked.... that can open up many possibilities.

Judy

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From: gweaver <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 05 Sep 1996 12:02:47 +0500

> basement. It's a shame to waste such nice coldness. Any ideas?

I don't know the quantity of flow you have, obviously not much since the
house requires a well, but look at water-sourced heat pumps.  You
probably need a small unit.  You may be able to get as much as 1 ton of
heating/cooling without the need for an expensive ground loop, expense
of submersible pump, or even the nominal cost of a circulating pump. 
Water quality is the concern for this type of open loop.

You may be able to supplement the spring with a nominal flow from the
well to achieve 100% heating/cooling for the house!