Our geothermal system works off water from our well. We bought an existing house, and the owner "never had any problems". Running the well pump as much as our colder than normal winter has been too much for it. We have replaced the pump with a higher horsepower Feb, 2013. We have had it stop working 3 times and now have to replace it...again. My theory is: A well pump is not meant to run so long at a time. Logic tells me that we are using twice as much electricity heating and cooling this way because we have to also run the well pump AND the heating unit. If we had access to city water, I can't even imagine what the water bill would be using our system. If you are thinking about using geothermal and using water instead of underground air, don't do it.

Tracey - some points of reference for out local climate/economy Nobody uses anything but flex duct at R8(code in attic and used elsewhere for simplicity). Our original HVAC budget was $13 and we spent $20. One contractor was $30 for metal ducts. Original was Seer 13 with no frills. We got Seer 15/16 Heat pump with gas backup down/electric up. Variable speed. 2 stage. Zoning. Total of 7 tons - 4 down, 3 up Your specs are typical in that they are not very informative. They don't give size - usually what they'll do is say that they can maintain 20 degrees cooler than outside and ?? degrees warmer. If you have the $$, seer 15 is generally worth it. I think dual fuel (ie gas and HP) is worth it. Variable speed and 2 stage are more comfort items - worth it if they are worth it to you (the other 2 are worth it in $$ saved). If you have the land and the $$, geothermal is worth considering. To throws numbers around, I suspect we would have spent $40 for geo - down to $27 after tax credit. If you have land, the geo should be less - perhaps down to $20 after tax credit. You can then not have gas, longer life of Pumps, quieter operation, no external pieces and of course energy savings. Geothermal is the one of the few options for tax credits on new construction. In my situation, the money saved was not worth it in just $$$. Lastly - there are a few items for our climate worth mentioning (forgive me if I have done this before). R-40 in the attic cost me $200 and reportedly saves $50 a year (code is r-30). Radiant barrier in the attic gave similar numbers. Energy star certification cost me $850 (or so) but saves me 5% on gas and electricity for life (Progress Energy and PSNC) - payback about 8 years. The extra insulating they do with energy star (cost hard to figure) all makes a ton of sense - mostly using foam around windows and doors - which I think cost $200. They also install backing behind tubs/soffits/on attic walls - that is hard to figure cost of since it went to the framers

This is from my husband: My husband checked and there was no water coming out of the condensate drain of the heat pump. He also turned off the whole house air exchanger. Still the air was being sucked through the whole house air exchanger. He tested this by holding a piece of paper up to outside vent and the paper was sucked onto the vent. Since the humidity outside has been running between 60-75%, it has been pulling all this humid air through the entire house and nothing is going back out through the condensate drain. All this humid air is staying in the house. We have two dehumidifiers running full steam, that are pulling about 10-11 gallons of water out of the house per day, still the humidity won't go below 50%. What we did (on our own) was to turn the air exchanger off and tape the vents so that no air could be pulled in. We then called the technician and explained all of this to him. The technician came today. Before he came, we un-taped the vent. He checked the freon. It looked ok, but he added just a tiny bit, for good measure. He pulled the cover off the air handler and there was NO water coming off the coils into the condensation pan. The temperatures on the heat pump while running were normal. He says he is coming back tomorrow and is going to put a damper on the air exchanger so it will only open when the air exchanger comes on.Until then he suggested that we tape the vent to the air exchanger closed, so as not to allow any air to come into the house. The technician never said why water was not condensing into the drain pan. My husband did ask him, but he evaded the answer, possibly because he didn't know, but my husband feels like he will come back with an answer tomorrow. The air temperature setting in our home, which is 69 degrees, has served to keep the house @ 69 degrees. My husband's theory is that possibly the air in our home is not warm enough to condense on the coils, thus it just passes on though to our house because the fan speed is blowing so hard and fast. My husband raised the temperature on our thermostats (we have three zones) to 72 degrees. With the two humidifiers going (one in the basement and one on the second level) and no humid air being brought through the air exchanger, it is his hope that we will be able to bring our humidity down. This is what my husband who, honestly is not expert here, has figured on his own and if it quite possible that he is onto something. MY thinking is that we paid over 24,000 for this and we should be having NO problems. And I would like your opinions. My husband feels that after doing what he did, which included taking one humidifier from the basement to the upstairs, that he has possibly stabilized the air to 50%. I feel like something much worse is wrong with the system that we should not have to be doing this stuff. Please submit opinions, and God bless you for all your responses. The people we have dealt with are such jerks,the owner hanging up on my husband when he tries t discuss something with him, scheduling us for appointments and then never showing to help us with this problem...It has truly been a nightmare. Also a question from me....does this mean that we will never be able to have our temps set below 72 again? I suffocate at temps over 70.

You're right, funnycide, in that we probably won't need more than a one ton unit. I believe the Acadia is making a two ton unit for radiant heat, but even that is too big for us and I've put the question to the firm as to whether or not a one ton unit is in the works. From what I've read, the Acadia is assembled from off-the-shelf, standard parts. How they are put together is new. A "local" dealer is located half-an-hour from us. From what I've read, installation is on the high-end of traditional systems -- nothing like geothermal. But we've a long way to go before settling on the Acadia, like I said, because we don't want an oversized system. I know it would kill the air conditioning, if nothing else. One of the reasons I really like the idea of the Acadia is that we will get gouged if we go with propane gas. Our local dealer charges an exorbitant amount if you use just a little gas. For example, our friends have a gas cookstove. Two years ago they were paying upwards of $7/unit because they used so little. We will not reap the economies of scale with gas. Also, with electric there is the possibility of photo volataic. We're being cautious with this. Watching the internet for reports on the company and it's product because we don't want to get burned with a flash-in-the-pan but don't want to pass up a really good, new technology either. I know that I'd buy a hypercar from the Rocky Mountain Institute in a heartbeat if I were loaded, new technology and start-up company and all.