"If you can fit a delivery truck into the area, you can go geo," said Adam Santry, vice president of Allied Geo-Systems, the Baltimore well-drilling company that did the Borles' bores.
There are other considerations. Among them: Retrofitting is disruptive, installation during new-home construction much less so; while the plastic piping doesn't burn fossil fuels, the electricity powering a geothermal system may be a different matter; drilling goes into the ground, and maybe, water, and is subject to well-drilling requirements; components generally have long warranties, but the up-front investment remains higher than for a conventional system.
"It's double the cost," said Matt Shanley, president of JBL Constructions Co., who put a geo-exchange system, along with other energy efficiencies, into a 5,000-square-foot model home in Howard County listed for $1.29 million.
"I will continue to put the extra money in these houses if the market will bear it," he said.
The cost has largely limited installation in new homes to owners who really want it; conventional wisdom is that a major investment to hold down utility bills helps when it's time to sell a house.
(President George W. Bush has a geo-exchange system in his Crawford, Texas, ranch.)
"We are using it on just about every house we build now," said Jon Skarda, president of Shore-Line Construction Enterprises in Middle River, which builds mostly waterfront homes in Baltimore County ranging from $400,000 to $1.5 million.
Clients lean toward geothermal as he shows them the math, Skarda said.
His example: On a 4,000-square-foot home, geothermal costs nearly $40,000 or roughly twice that of a conventional system. On a 30-year fixed mortgage of 7 percent, that additional $20,000 investment adds a little more than $150 a month. But the typical utility savings will be closer to $200 a month. Depending on home heating and electric rates and usage, the difference will balance out in as little as five to seven years, he said.
Spurred by the need to replace their heat pump, George and Lynn Kasch turned to geothermal in February for their all-electric 2,500-square-foot, ranch-style home in Middle River. The replacement cost for the heat pump was approaching half the price of geothermal, and they wouldn't have trimmed their utility bill, they said.
"We checked our bill from this time last year and we saved $160 for one month," George Kasch said. "Money is money."
