Is a Tankless Water Heater Right for You?
April 03, 2024
Tankless water heaters have been gaining popularity for many reasons, including their small profile, their energy-saving properties, and their ability to provide endless hot water. Although tankless water heaters can offer these benefits, they still have limitations that can affect their suitability in certain situations. If you’re wondering whether tankless water heater installation is the right step for your home, it’s important to evaluate your current hot water habits and your goals for a tankless system before you purchase your next water heater.
Evaluating Your Hot Water Needs
Tankless water heaters are capable of delivering endless hot water; however, a single tankless water heater can have trouble providing hot water to several taps or appliances at once. This property makes tankless systems ideal for homes that tend to use hot water for prolonged periods of time at a single source, such as a family that tends to shower one after another. In these cases, tankless water heater installation allows for continuous use of the hot water for the same purpose with the confidence that a storage tank heater cannot provide. However, homes that require hot water in multiple places at once, such as families in which members shower, cook, and run the washing machine simultaneously, may not get the same consistency from a single whole-home tankless water heater. While these homes often choose storage tank water heaters, a combination of multiple whole-home tankless systems or point-of-use tankless water heaters can still achieve the same results. If you’d like both the reliability of endless hot water and the ability to have hot water in multiple locations at once, your plumber can design a tankless system configuration to meet your needs.
Determining Your Ideal Water Heater Profile
Storage tank water heaters require significant space to accommodate the tank responsible for holding hot water. Thus, not only can your water heater take up space you might otherwise use for storage, but the space available in your home can also limit the size of the storage tank water heater you can install. By contrast, tankless water heaters have small, rectangular profiles and can be installed via mounting on a wall. This frees up potential storage space and certainly makes accessing the area around the water heater much easier and more convenient. If you’re looking to upgrade your water heater but don’t have additional space for a larger appliance, tankless water heater installation could be the perfect choice for your home. Additionally, if you’re running short on storage space and would like to utilize the area currently occupied by your water heater, replacing a storage tank with a tankless system can free up valuable floor space that may be at a premium.
When it’s time for a new water heater, our plumbers in Omaha are here to help. We pride ourselves on our up-to-date knowledge of the plumbing industry and our ability to tailor our plumbing services to your needs for the best results in terms of performance and savings. Please check out our website to learn more about the plumbing products we offer, including tankless water heaters and high-efficiency tank water heaters, where you can also learn about the benefits of regular plumbing maintenance and professional plumbing repair to keep your water heater running efficiently. If you’d like more information and advice on home plumbing and comfort issues, we also invite you to check out our monthly blog.