ᐅ House electricity consumption – what is your usage?

With four people, I will use just under 3700 kWh of electricity this year, including daily irrigation in the summer. I am quite satisfied with that.

Heinz2k schrieb:

Consumption 2020

5600 kWh, of which 1600 kWh were used by the heat pump.
2460 kWh of the consumption was covered by the photovoltaic system (44%).
9000 kWh were fed back into the grid.

It was a year with a lot of home office work, which also explains the high level of self-sufficiency (without storage).

The consumption is good for the heat pump, but it shows again that geothermal energy is not a good choice. It takes over 50 years to pay off. Especially for such small houses, it is economically unreasonable.

Same experience in my circle of friends, who would never choose one again. After 5 years, high repair costs. Monthly consumption significantly worse than yours. The system was never properly calibrated.

Bookstar schrieb:

The consumption is good for the heat pump, but it again shows that geothermal energy is not a good choice. It takes over 50 years to pay off. Especially for such small houses, it’s economically nonsensical.

How do you come up with 50 years?
That’s just nonsense to say without any background!

Let me clarify this for our situation:
For example, we paid only slightly more for geothermal energy than for an air-source heat pump solution (partly because of some DIY work).

But in general, even without any DIY contribution, it pays off in well under 50 years.

You have to find or have the right contact person and not blindly trust heating contractors who naturally prefer to sell the “easier” air-source heat pumps because they involve less work!

A deep borehole is usually much too expensive.
Trench collectors are the benchmark here when you consider cost versus benefit.

Here are some general facts about geothermal energy:
- Purchase cost for the heat pump is about €2000-4000 higher
- Installation of trenches including brine distributor etc. costs about €2000-4000 (depending on DIY involvement)
- BAFA subsidy for new builds is €4500
- Usually has a longer service life than air-source heat pumps (though it can of course sometimes be problematic)
- Annual performance factor is usually at least 1 point better

In our case, we currently have an annual electricity consumption for heating of about 1400 kWh at 22°C (72°F) room temperature and 44°C (111°F) domestic hot water.

Annual costs are about €450.
With an air-source heat pump, we would be at around €650 (assuming a coefficient of performance of about 3.5).
So even in the worst case, the payback period would be at most 20-30 years, not 50??

Please do not confuse a trench collector with geothermal energy.

Geothermal energy always implies deep drilling for me, and that usually means around 50 years, sometimes significantly longer. DIY options like horizontal trench collectors and similar systems obviously seem more attractive. However, they are still completely unprofitable.

Bookstar schrieb:


Similar experience within my circle of acquaintances; they would never get one again. After 5 years, high repair costs. Monthly consumption significantly worse than yours. The system was never properly balanced.

The same can happen to any other system. I also agree that it only pays off over a very long period; still, I find this kind of discussion tedious. The bathroom installation, for instance, which visibly costs around 20,000€ (about $22,000), doesn’t pay off either—nor does a new car.

I simply enjoy the technology and the low energy consumption. I also think it adds overall value, even though I can’t immediately spend that on anything.