[You Need a Thneed]

Originally Posted by DeluxeMoustache

Never really fully agreed with the environmental argument for tankless. Consider the concept of hearing your overall house as a balancing of heat sources and losses. Open the window or door and you lose heat, your furnace has to make up for it. If your tank loses heat, it loses that heat in to the interior of your house. As long as it is within the insulated portion of your house, that heat goes in to the overall heating equation. With a tankless, your furnace potentially fires more to make up for that missing heat source.

The argument in favour is really unlimited hot water supply, not overall energy savings. Unless you are in a hot climate using a decent amount of air conditioning.

Unless your hot water heater is right beside the couch, the heat lost to the area immediately around your heater is completely useless to the overall heating of your house. Just like the argument that incandescent lightbulbs help heat the house. They do, but extra heat up by the ceiling if of no use to the occupants of the house.

It helps heat your house, but who really cares if your furnace room is a degree warmer than it would otherwise be?