I recently moved into an apartment in Columbus, Ohio, and, naturally enough, I’m looking for ways to save energy. Well, naturally enough for me. I’m told that not everyone thinks the way I do! Go figure!

Anyway, this four-unit building has natural gas air- and water-heating: four individual forced-air furnaces and four 40-gallon water heaters occupy a fair portion of the basement space. Of course I spent some time poking around down there, taking a look at plumbing runs and ducting. There’s a mixture of copper and Pex tubing for the plumbing—evidence of a plumbing overhaul sometime in the building’s past.

Something about what I saw there disturbed me. I traced the plumbing lines leading from my hot water heater (a standard, central-flume, natural gas-fired unit) and quickly became confused. It’s a bit complex since the plumbing is individualized for each unit and each includes a run to a separate utility sink and washing machine hookups. I don’t plan to install a washer or dryer, but still there was something very odd: it looked like the hot water run coming out of my tank was connected to the cold water supply line of the building.

Huh?!

I was temporarily stumped. I assumed I just didn’t know enough about household plumbing to understand what was going on. Meantime, I noticed that the hot water delivery to the shower was… less than ideal. You know how it is: you move into a new place and though you’ve put your outward efforts into getting the best deal and landing in the neighborhood you prefer and all that stuff, what you secretly hope for is that water pressure and temperature are good for hot showers! It’s a secret hope because one doesn’t want to be accused of being a waster of water and energy, especially when one works for a renewable energy company. Ahem! To my credit, I had already installed a low-flow showerhead with an on-off valve. I’d hoped the showerhead might improve the feel of the water stream at least, which is on the weak side. Well, the flow was acceptable, but the temperature was borderline. Personally, I don’t like a scalding hot shower; but even with the hot tap fully open and the cold off, I was not entirely comfortable.

I went back downstairs. “Hmm. Maybe I’ll just turn up the water heater’s temperature setting a bit.” Well, it was set slightly below the presumed “normal” marker. so I turned it up. The result the next day was slightly better, but still I was running all hot and no cold. I returned to the basement a few more times to stare at the pipes in bewilderment before it dawned on me what was wrong: the plumber had connected the plumbing to the hot water heater backwards. The cold water supply line was connected to the fitting marked “HOT” on the top of the tank, while the hot water line leading up to my apartment was connected to the “COLD” fitting! Doh!

“Is there a difference?” you ask. Turns out there is. The anatomy of a typical water heater tank includes a pipe called a “dip tube” that is connected to the “COLD” fitting at the top of the tank. The dip tube carries incoming cold water nearly to the bottom of the tank. This way, cold water from the building supply arrives near the (in my case) natural gas burner located beneath the water vessel. As it’s heated, the water rises by convection. This natural convection cycle assures that the hottest water in the tank is found at the top. And that’s where hot water is drawn out of the tan, from the “HOT” fitting, which has no dip tube. Except that, in my case, the opposite has been happening: I’m drawing water, through the dip tube, from the bottom of the tank, where it’s coldest, so my showers have been…. less than satisfying. The water heater, of course, doesn’t know the difference.

I put in a call to my new landlord, keeping my fingers crossed that he was willing to correct the situation (and knowing I am enough of a stickler to be willing to pay a plumber myself to get it fixed). To my joy, he was perfectly willing to send his plumber to fix the problem. The holidays got in the way, but I’m eagerly looking forward to a long, hot shower— er, to reducing my energy consumption! And after the work is done, I’ll move on to the next step: I have already bought an insulating jacket for the tank and a few six-foot lengths of pipe insulation that I will install on the exposed piping I can access there on the basement ceiling. If all goes well, I hope to engage the curiosity—and savings interest—of my three neighbors; perhaps I can get them to do the same with their tanks and pipes. And, yes, I already checked— their tanks are plumbed properly!

~Ben
AltE