The residential water heater – often unsightly and awkwardly installed in garages and closets – is an essential home appliance that is often overlooked when it comes to energy efficiency upgrades. This is despite the fact that gas-powered water heaters are the second largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in California’s building sector. Reaching ambitious greenhouse gas reduction goals will be virtually impossible without reimagining the residential water heater — and CalSEED Concept Awardee ZYD Energy is doing just that.
The first step in decarbonizing residential water heaters is to replace all gas water heaters currently in use with electric heat pumps. The second — and potentially far more complex — step is to integrate electric heat pumps with the electric grid to ensure electricity from renewable energy sources, e.g. solar and wind, is used to heat water. This is where ZYD Energy’s innovative LOCUS control technology comes in. LOCUS stands for load optimization control using storage and will enable heat pump water heaters to achieve grid-interactive efficient operations, which reduce customers’ energy bills, maximize renewable energy utilization, and minimize greenhouse gas emissions. ZYD Energy seeks to advance water heater technology through a three prong strategy:
- Integration: using controllable storage configurations to achieve large load flexibility for all heat pump water heater products and system designs, including those not feasible for conventional temperature controls.
- Optimization: using sophisticated computer algorithms to determine operational schedules according to time-dependent electricity supply conditions, including electricity price, demand response signals, renewable energy availability, and electricity carbon intensity.
- Connectivity: using IoT technologies to establish versatile data connection with users, building and grid management.
Learn more about this innovative solution case study by visiting CalSEED's website.
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