Heat Your Outdoor Hot Tub Using Solar Panels

Outdoor hot tubs are a complete and luxurious way to unwind and relieve stress after a long day of work. Owning a hot tub comes with many benefits. Having a spa right at home could be the key to unlocking your work-life balance. It could be the factor that encourages prospective tenants to choose your rental property over another or convinces prospective home buyers to place an offer. 

However, one of the major barriers for homeowners when it comes to buying or frequently using an outdoor hot tub is its high operating cost. This is where your investment in solar energy can become really handy. 

Why Use Solar Energy For Outdoor Hot Tub Heating

Solar-powered hot tubs are more environmentally friendly to have and you’ll likely also end up saving money. Solar thermal equipment is fairly inexpensive and also relatively easy to install. 

In addition, purchasing the various solar elements you’ll need for your hot tub isn’t the only cost-effective part of the process. Your return will improve over the long term because heating a hot tub can be relatively expensive otherwise.                 

How Does Solar Power Hot Tub Heating Work

You can warm your hot tub through solar energy with the help of a heat exchange panel. This is relatively simple technology but will be effective if you live somewhere that gets around 6 hours of strong sun, or more, per day. 

The other problem is that this type of system can’t store energy. Also, it heats the water when it is probably least needed – in the heat of the day. Unfortunately once the sun goes down so does the water temperature.

Getting your hot tub connected up to a solar panel is a better idea. Before you start looking for panels to buy check that your hot tub is out of warranty. If it is in warranty making the modifications that you will need to make to the hot tub will almost certainly invalidate the warranty.

There is also another option that won’t invalidate your warranty. You can connect your hot tub to battery storage, powered by a solar panel via a solar kit. You would probably need to contact the manufacturer of the kit to see if there was one that might be suitable for running a hot tub. Hot tubs need a lot of energy you would probably need to supplement a solar kit with mains electricity. 

Solar Panels And Hot Tubs

Most hot tub manufacturers have realized the need to make their designs more energy efficient. However, without completely redesigning their products and overhauling their manufacturing processes, most companies have only made minor changes to existing designs, which results in only minor energy savings for consumers.

At the same time, solar energy adoption has improved markedly. It has adequately filled the spot of a more affordable, sustainable, and cleaner power source. As we head into another recession because of the pandemic, using solar panels for a high energy-consumption device like an outdoor hot tub makes perfect sense.

Thanks for Reading!

Brian McKay
(aka The Solar Guy)