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> As a German living in a city with mandatory district heating... the end result is to be that people seem pay more for heating than they would with a decentra

> As a German living in a city with mandatory district heating... the end result is to be that people seem pay more for heating than they would with a decentralised system. So, in America, it is very common for hot water tanks to suddenly fail, leaking water everywhere and causing massive amounts of property damage and even creating health hazards through mold. In a not-insane world, all hot water tanks would come with moisture meters (you can buy them at the hardware store, $20 maybe) that would alert when the tank started to fail. But no, instead, American's are just accustom to the idea that about every 10-15 years, they will have to fix some large amount of water damage. The condo complex I used to live in had a huge line item for water damage very year, insurance companies charge a large deductible because they know the damage is going to happen. Recently the condo association has taken to enforcing manual inspections of hot water heaters and requires they be replaced after 10 years, due to the large number of insurance claims that were being made. (I did suggest they just enforce the use of moisture detectors...) Oh and in condos, the hot water tanks are supposed to be hooked up to a drain so this flooding isn't an issue. But, well, apparently most of them were not hooked up properly. :/ FWIW I've seen this same issue in multiple places I've lived, apartment complexes have issues with hot water tanks going out all the time. So anyway, my point is, Americans are really bad at moving hot water around.

pkaye 4y ago
If they changed the anode rod on the water heater periodically it might last longer. Also the reality is that HVAC and water heater might need periodic inspections.
- com2kid 4y ago
  I was thankful, and shocked, the one year of my life that my HVAC system didn't break down in some fashion. Hot water heaters should have leak detectors on them. They often don't. The higher end models do. Product differentiation strikes again. Last water heater I had, the anode was A-OK, I had it checked about a year prior to the water heater failing. Thermal stress destroys stuff.
  - sbierwagen 4y ago
    Anode rods are consumable. Did you personally see the rod itself during the inspection? They also don't repair damage. A really mean thing to do would be to replace the anode on a nearly-dead water heater right before selling a house. The minute the anode finishes rusting away, the heater could let go.
  - taeric 4y ago
    I've... Never had a problem that was catastrophic in my adult life. Only real issue we've ever had was someone hit the ac unit with their car. Curious what sort of load you put on yours to have such terrible luck.
    - zbrozek 4y ago
      I had one catastrophic failure and several minor ones. Now I have a tankless water heater.
  - themitigating 4y ago
    Where I'm from mostly installations have a 2 inch deep drip pan which you place a water detector. It emits a very loud noise if the bottom of it gets wet ex. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Basement-Watchdog-Battery-Operated-Water-Alarm-BWD-HWA/100038838 https://www.homedepot.com/p/Basement-Watchdog-Battery-Operat... This doesn't help for catastrophic failures but for leaks it should.
  - NavinF 4y ago
    > one year of my life that my HVAC system didn't break down in some fashion Something’s wrong here. I’ve only seen 1 partial failure (a refrigerant leak reduced efficiency by 5x, but the AC still worked) in the last 15 years across several houses. You’ve got an order of magnitude more failures. Do you live on a boat? :P
    - com2kid 4y ago
      Hydronic heating system[1] (hot water running under the floors) that was incompetently installed. No expansion tanks, wrong pipes used (no oxygen barrier so oxygen seeped in and rusted the cast iron pump), pressure wasn't balanced, just tons of issues. My current house's HVAC system was also done piss poorly in places and there can be a 15 degree difference between rooms, so that's going to be 10k+ to fix. Fun times. [1]Despite the obscene maintenance costs, the luxury is worth it. Warm floors are really nice!
hedora 4y ago
There’s a cheap ($20?) add on for our water heater that adds a conductivity sensor in the drip pan, and a shutoff valve on the inlet. There’s a slightly more expensive variant from another company that supposedly looks at flow for the whole house, and cuts water off due to slow leaks or burst pipes. I’m shocked that the water heater cutoff valve isn’t required by code. In contrast, plumbed drain lines for water tank flushing have a much worse payoff per dollar and are required by code around here. (When I’m feeling cynical, I assume that the codes here are designed to subsidize contractors while maximally screwing over home owners.) Edit: the plumbed lines don’t actually help with leaks; so they do nothing that a garden hose would not accomplish.
- com2kid 4y ago
  > There’s a cheap ($20?) add on for our water heater that adds a conductivity sensor in the drip pan, and a shutoff valve on the inlet. Oh I know, they are awesome. They should come standard, and more people should know about them. It is one of those things I try to bring up in conversations at random, because holy crap the # of people I know who have had water damage from their water heating dramatically failing is too high. Heck it happened to my family twice while I was growing up. > the plumbed lines don’t actually help with leaks; so they do nothing that a garden hose would not accomplish. Why not? I've seen places where with a drip pan angled towards a hole connects to a pipe that drains outside. It should work for slow leaks. Doesn't do anything if the tank bursts of course...
  - pickup191 4y ago
    What’s the name of this 20 dollar device?!
    - com2kid 4y ago
      Just a water tank moisture detector, e.g. https://a.co/0ujkOuD https://a.co/0ujkOuD
  - lazide 4y ago
    The drip pan is for slow leaks , not for flushing or a gusher - but most gushers start as slow leaks, and it’s easy for a drip to cause massive damage if it goes unnoticed for months.
ethagknight 4y ago
This comment is wrong on many levels. Hot water heaters should last a lot longer, and when they fail it’s probably a faulty thermostat or short. Still, water heaters get a drain pan to catch leaks. Lastly, installing a leak detectors are trivial and common. Your condo may have been a bad install or not installed to code. America moves hot water just fine. EDIT: yes water heaters can fail. Usually due to bad install, people store stuff on the pipes or on top of the unit treating the mechanical closet like a utility storage closet for brooms vacuum ironing board stuffed in, or subjected to a freeze. Nothing wrong with the device itself, everything to do with improper install or maintenance.
- com2kid 4y ago
  > Lastly, installing a leak detectors are trivial and common. I've told about a dozen people in my life that leak detectors were a thing, and they were all shocked at the info. From what I gather, their existence is not common knowledge. > Still, water heaters get a drain pan to catch leaks. Initial leaks yes, but eventually hot water heats fail in a dramatic fashion and spew water everywhere. > Your condo may have been a bad install or not installed to code. Literally every apartment complex I've lived in has had this same issue. The apartment complex's my friends live in, same issue. I figure that commercially ran complexes would be motivated to install leak detectors, but apparently not. > Hot water heaters should last a lot longer, and when they fail it’s probably a faulty thermostat or short. Should, sure. The warranty is 10 years on higher end models, and the last ($2000!) water heater I had fail on me failed at 9 years and 6 months. I've seen older hot water heaters, sure, but the expectation is failure after 10 years. All the plumbers I've ever talked to have repeated exactly that. They also say that a large # of tankless units they have seen encounter motor failures after 10 years and also have to be replaced.
  - KennyBlanken 4y ago
    Tanks don't fail unless the anode gets depleted. You seriously need to tell your condo association to get their maintenance people to flush the water heaters regularly (seasonally or annually) and check/change the anodes. If they're gas-fired heaters, the burner and air intakes should be getting cleaned. If this isn't being done, it's probably because your maintenance is being done by plumbers, who have convinced everyone that "they just fail, you know?" Replacing a tankless water heater because the motor has failed is silly. You replace the motor. And tankless heaters don't fail very often unless, again, they don't see regular maintenance. As in: flush/descale annually and water/air filter cleanings.
fy20 4y ago
Last year, one of the district heating pipes in my fairly new apartment block (7 years old) start leaking where it enters the building. Once discovered someone from the heating company came to turn off our supply, and then the next day they came to dig up the pavement outside and fix it. On a side note, it seems like a very bad design choice to have that place be the room where all the electrical meters are. However even where there were large puddles of water over the floor it didn't cause any issues.
WalterBright 4y ago
> in America, it is very common for hot water tanks to suddenly fail, leaking water everywhere and causing massive amounts of property damage and even creating health hazards through mold. I've had them fail and leak many times. But I had the water heater put in the basement next to a floor drain, and the floor slopes slightly towards the drain. No damage whatsoever from leaks, and it wasn't an emergency to get it fixed, either. It's stupid simple and cheap to do this, I dunno why I've never seen any other dwelling with such a setup. My house has a number of things like this, making it cheap to maintain. P.S. I'm an American.
- lazide 4y ago
  At least in California it’s mandatory that it be this way. A good idea, but not sure it it’s code, is to do the same with the clothes washer. Flood sensors (there are ones with auto water shutoffs too) for the clothes and dish washers are a good idea too.
- moistly 4y ago
  The BC Building Code mandates a floor pan under the HWH, draining into the wastewater system. The floor will be sloped as well, and the drain within X distance of the heater. I expect it’s a Canadian national standard.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    The plumbers are always surprised to find my setup. It's the same for the washing machine, which has also saved me from very expensive water damage.
- Fatnino 4y ago
  When my parents got their house one of the requirements my mom had was to move the water heater out of the hall closet and into a lean-to outside the kitchen door. When I was a baby we lived in my aunt's basement for a few months and the water heater flooded the basement and my mom swore she would never live in the same house as one of those again.
1123581321 4y ago
Disagree with all of this. Hot water leaks are very rare. Water heater failure usually manifests as cold showers and a quick replacement unit from a plumber. Drain pan with a hose is a more reliable protection than a sensor. Sensors are much more likely to give annoying false positives than to prevent damage; you can see from Rheem discussion forums that they’re not appreciated.
- osigurdson 4y ago
  I think the real problem is how susceptible houses in US/Canada (maybe elsewhere) are to water leaks of any sort. Drywall, wood, MDF, insulation, etc., are all immediately destroyed with water in a short amount of time. A typical house lasts for 100 years or more and will likely experience many water leaks of various kinds over the course of its lifetime.
  - Fatnino 4y ago
    Houses last 100 years? They can, but typically after 20 years it starts to make economic sense to scoop the remains of the house into a dump truck and build a fancier house on the now much more expensive land under it. In my neighborhood (admittedly, originally built in the 50s) every single sale I can remember from the last 15 years has resulted it a complete teardown and rebuild bigger. And one of those rebuilds recently changed hands and is undergoing extensive remodeling for over a year now.
    - parineum 4y ago
      20 years!? That's absurd. It never makes economic sense to tear down a house if you're paying for it (above the land value). It depends on building codes in your area and such but my house is nearly 40 and it's not even close to end of life. Hell, the house I grew up in is still there and it's gotta be approaching 80.
      - mschuster91 4y ago
        > It never makes economic sense to tear down a house if you're paying for it (above the land value). The land value is the key. Often, houses in the 50s-80s were built in what was suburbs or actual small villages back then, with enormous land surrounding them because land was cheap. Nowadays, the urban areas have grown and grown, and with them the desire for space for people to live on - even here in Europe, in Munich for example, land values exploded over the last 20-30 years. Think of like the land price not only doubling or tripling, but increasing tenfold or more since the houses were built. Say you have land with a house that was worth 50.000 $ when it was constructed... and now, the land alone can be worth millions. So you tear down the existing house that's in the middle of the plot, build four new houses on it, each one bigger than the old one, and sell three of the four houses to pay for your new home and a nice chunk of cash. Or you rent the houses out for absurd amounts of money and never have to work a day in your life again. And that happens not just with houses 50 years or older. Here in Munich, I've seen this happen with houses younger than me, simply because land values went up so immensely.
themitigating 4y ago
You kinda offer a solution by telling us about the annual inspections. There are also water alarms that go in the pan under a water heater for slow leaks. I've also seen them placed in areas with tile floors and a drain just in case. Sounds like much of the decentralized system damage from water heaters is customer neglect.

pkaye 4y ago

If they changed the anode rod on the water heater periodically it might last longer. Also the reality is that HVAC and water heater might need periodic inspections.

com2kid 4y ago
I was thankful, and shocked, the one year of my life that my HVAC system didn't break down in some fashion. Hot water heaters should have leak detectors on them. They often don't. The higher end models do. Product differentiation strikes again. Last water heater I had, the anode was A-OK, I had it checked about a year prior to the water heater failing. Thermal stress destroys stuff.
- sbierwagen 4y ago
  Anode rods are consumable. Did you personally see the rod itself during the inspection? They also don't repair damage. A really mean thing to do would be to replace the anode on a nearly-dead water heater right before selling a house. The minute the anode finishes rusting away, the heater could let go.
- taeric 4y ago
  I've... Never had a problem that was catastrophic in my adult life. Only real issue we've ever had was someone hit the ac unit with their car. Curious what sort of load you put on yours to have such terrible luck.
  - zbrozek 4y ago
    I had one catastrophic failure and several minor ones. Now I have a tankless water heater.
- themitigating 4y ago
  Where I'm from mostly installations have a 2 inch deep drip pan which you place a water detector. It emits a very loud noise if the bottom of it gets wet ex. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Basement-Watchdog-Battery-Operated-Water-Alarm-BWD-HWA/100038838 https://www.homedepot.com/p/Basement-Watchdog-Battery-Operat... This doesn't help for catastrophic failures but for leaks it should.
- NavinF 4y ago
  > one year of my life that my HVAC system didn't break down in some fashion Something’s wrong here. I’ve only seen 1 partial failure (a refrigerant leak reduced efficiency by 5x, but the AC still worked) in the last 15 years across several houses. You’ve got an order of magnitude more failures. Do you live on a boat? :P
  - com2kid 4y ago
    Hydronic heating system[1] (hot water running under the floors) that was incompetently installed. No expansion tanks, wrong pipes used (no oxygen barrier so oxygen seeped in and rusted the cast iron pump), pressure wasn't balanced, just tons of issues. My current house's HVAC system was also done piss poorly in places and there can be a 15 degree difference between rooms, so that's going to be 10k+ to fix. Fun times. [1]Despite the obscene maintenance costs, the luxury is worth it. Warm floors are really nice!

hedora 4y ago

There’s a cheap ($20?) add on for our water heater that adds a conductivity sensor in the drip pan, and a shutoff valve on the inlet. There’s a slightly more expensive variant from another company that supposedly looks at flow for the whole house, and cuts water off due to slow leaks or burst pipes. I’m shocked that the water heater cutoff valve isn’t required by code. In contrast, plumbed drain lines for water tank flushing have a much worse payoff per dollar and are required by code around here. (When I’m feeling cynical, I assume that the codes here are designed to subsidize contractors while maximally screwing over home owners.) Edit: the plumbed lines don’t actually help with leaks; so they do nothing that a garden hose would not accomplish.

com2kid 4y ago
> There’s a cheap ($20?) add on for our water heater that adds a conductivity sensor in the drip pan, and a shutoff valve on the inlet. Oh I know, they are awesome. They should come standard, and more people should know about them. It is one of those things I try to bring up in conversations at random, because holy crap the # of people I know who have had water damage from their water heating dramatically failing is too high. Heck it happened to my family twice while I was growing up. > the plumbed lines don’t actually help with leaks; so they do nothing that a garden hose would not accomplish. Why not? I've seen places where with a drip pan angled towards a hole connects to a pipe that drains outside. It should work for slow leaks. Doesn't do anything if the tank bursts of course...
- pickup191 4y ago
  What’s the name of this 20 dollar device?!
  - com2kid 4y ago
    Just a water tank moisture detector, e.g. https://a.co/0ujkOuD https://a.co/0ujkOuD
- lazide 4y ago
  The drip pan is for slow leaks , not for flushing or a gusher - but most gushers start as slow leaks, and it’s easy for a drip to cause massive damage if it goes unnoticed for months.

ethagknight 4y ago

This comment is wrong on many levels. Hot water heaters should last a lot longer, and when they fail it’s probably a faulty thermostat or short. Still, water heaters get a drain pan to catch leaks. Lastly, installing a leak detectors are trivial and common. Your condo may have been a bad install or not installed to code. America moves hot water just fine. EDIT: yes water heaters can fail. Usually due to bad install, people store stuff on the pipes or on top of the unit treating the mechanical closet like a utility storage closet for brooms vacuum ironing board stuffed in, or subjected to a freeze. Nothing wrong with the device itself, everything to do with improper install or maintenance.

com2kid 4y ago
> Lastly, installing a leak detectors are trivial and common. I've told about a dozen people in my life that leak detectors were a thing, and they were all shocked at the info. From what I gather, their existence is not common knowledge. > Still, water heaters get a drain pan to catch leaks. Initial leaks yes, but eventually hot water heats fail in a dramatic fashion and spew water everywhere. > Your condo may have been a bad install or not installed to code. Literally every apartment complex I've lived in has had this same issue. The apartment complex's my friends live in, same issue. I figure that commercially ran complexes would be motivated to install leak detectors, but apparently not. > Hot water heaters should last a lot longer, and when they fail it’s probably a faulty thermostat or short. Should, sure. The warranty is 10 years on higher end models, and the last ($2000!) water heater I had fail on me failed at 9 years and 6 months. I've seen older hot water heaters, sure, but the expectation is failure after 10 years. All the plumbers I've ever talked to have repeated exactly that. They also say that a large # of tankless units they have seen encounter motor failures after 10 years and also have to be replaced.
- KennyBlanken 4y ago
  Tanks don't fail unless the anode gets depleted. You seriously need to tell your condo association to get their maintenance people to flush the water heaters regularly (seasonally or annually) and check/change the anodes. If they're gas-fired heaters, the burner and air intakes should be getting cleaned. If this isn't being done, it's probably because your maintenance is being done by plumbers, who have convinced everyone that "they just fail, you know?" Replacing a tankless water heater because the motor has failed is silly. You replace the motor. And tankless heaters don't fail very often unless, again, they don't see regular maintenance. As in: flush/descale annually and water/air filter cleanings.

fy20 4y ago

Last year, one of the district heating pipes in my fairly new apartment block (7 years old) start leaking where it enters the building. Once discovered someone from the heating company came to turn off our supply, and then the next day they came to dig up the pavement outside and fix it. On a side note, it seems like a very bad design choice to have that place be the room where all the electrical meters are. However even where there were large puddles of water over the floor it didn't cause any issues.

WalterBright 4y ago

> in America, it is very common for hot water tanks to suddenly fail, leaking water everywhere and causing massive amounts of property damage and even creating health hazards through mold. I've had them fail and leak many times. But I had the water heater put in the basement next to a floor drain, and the floor slopes slightly towards the drain. No damage whatsoever from leaks, and it wasn't an emergency to get it fixed, either. It's stupid simple and cheap to do this, I dunno why I've never seen any other dwelling with such a setup. My house has a number of things like this, making it cheap to maintain. P.S. I'm an American.

lazide 4y ago
At least in California it’s mandatory that it be this way. A good idea, but not sure it it’s code, is to do the same with the clothes washer. Flood sensors (there are ones with auto water shutoffs too) for the clothes and dish washers are a good idea too.
moistly 4y ago
The BC Building Code mandates a floor pan under the HWH, draining into the wastewater system. The floor will be sloped as well, and the drain within X distance of the heater. I expect it’s a Canadian national standard.
- WalterBright 4y ago
  The plumbers are always surprised to find my setup. It's the same for the washing machine, which has also saved me from very expensive water damage.
Fatnino 4y ago
When my parents got their house one of the requirements my mom had was to move the water heater out of the hall closet and into a lean-to outside the kitchen door. When I was a baby we lived in my aunt's basement for a few months and the water heater flooded the basement and my mom swore she would never live in the same house as one of those again.

1123581321 4y ago

Disagree with all of this. Hot water leaks are very rare. Water heater failure usually manifests as cold showers and a quick replacement unit from a plumber. Drain pan with a hose is a more reliable protection than a sensor. Sensors are much more likely to give annoying false positives than to prevent damage; you can see from Rheem discussion forums that they’re not appreciated.

osigurdson 4y ago
I think the real problem is how susceptible houses in US/Canada (maybe elsewhere) are to water leaks of any sort. Drywall, wood, MDF, insulation, etc., are all immediately destroyed with water in a short amount of time. A typical house lasts for 100 years or more and will likely experience many water leaks of various kinds over the course of its lifetime.
- Fatnino 4y ago
  Houses last 100 years? They can, but typically after 20 years it starts to make economic sense to scoop the remains of the house into a dump truck and build a fancier house on the now much more expensive land under it. In my neighborhood (admittedly, originally built in the 50s) every single sale I can remember from the last 15 years has resulted it a complete teardown and rebuild bigger. And one of those rebuilds recently changed hands and is undergoing extensive remodeling for over a year now.
  - parineum 4y ago
    20 years!? That's absurd. It never makes economic sense to tear down a house if you're paying for it (above the land value). It depends on building codes in your area and such but my house is nearly 40 and it's not even close to end of life. Hell, the house I grew up in is still there and it's gotta be approaching 80.
    - mschuster91 4y ago
      > It never makes economic sense to tear down a house if you're paying for it (above the land value). The land value is the key. Often, houses in the 50s-80s were built in what was suburbs or actual small villages back then, with enormous land surrounding them because land was cheap. Nowadays, the urban areas have grown and grown, and with them the desire for space for people to live on - even here in Europe, in Munich for example, land values exploded over the last 20-30 years. Think of like the land price not only doubling or tripling, but increasing tenfold or more since the houses were built. Say you have land with a house that was worth 50.000 $ when it was constructed... and now, the land alone can be worth millions. So you tear down the existing house that's in the middle of the plot, build four new houses on it, each one bigger than the old one, and sell three of the four houses to pay for your new home and a nice chunk of cash. Or you rent the houses out for absurd amounts of money and never have to work a day in your life again. And that happens not just with houses 50 years or older. Here in Munich, I've seen this happen with houses younger than me, simply because land values went up so immensely.

themitigating 4y ago

You kinda offer a solution by telling us about the annual inspections. There are also water alarms that go in the pan under a water heater for slow leaks. I've also seen them placed in areas with tile floors and a drain just in case. Sounds like much of the decentralized system damage from water heaters is customer neglect.