Heated Swimming Pool

[Decho]

Does anyone on here live on a complex with a communal heated swimming pool?
Just looking for some ideas for costing and feasibility, solar or otherwise.
Thanks.

[Sam]

Not going to be much of help but we had a talk about heating our pool at the last community meeting and apparently it's not just about the extra energy cost but we would have to change the whole filtering system. I guess because of the higher temperature of the water.

[Captain Sensible]

I wouldn't have thought that any community would have a heated pool.  Our community pool costs enough without paying for heating.

[Spitfire58]

The only way you could do this economically would be with solar. Any other way the costs would be horrendous & I imagine you would have to ramp up the filtration system as well because the increased temperature is obviously going to increase the bacteria growth rate. My personal opinion, looking at a pool on a complex (which are not usually that small) would make this realistically impractical & economically unviable. Just my thoughts though 

[windermeregolfer]

As some one who has pools in hotels I have run I have a bit of experience. 

To give you an idea a neighbour of ours is just installing a German solar pool heating system costing about 3500€ for a pool 6x3mts x 1.4mts deep. The total panel area is about 4mts x 2.5mts as he has it as part of his garden sun room roof

I wouldn't have thought the actual filter system needs changing, what would happen is with the higher water temperature the chlorine consumption would increase, an automatic dosing system would cope with that and I would have thought a community pool already had one of those and someone would be testing the water quality daily.   

Hope that helps.

[bedouin]

Agree that solar ought to be feasible.  We often stay in the Bahia de Vera urbanisation in Vera Playa, and the outdoor pool there has in recent years had solar heating added.  Works well!

Filtration upgrades shouldn't be needed although, as John T said, sanitiser consumption may increase.  Many pool operators are changing to saltwater chlorination, which removes the need for dumping chemicals into the pool.  I converted my pool at home to saltwater chlorination a couple of years ago and it's much easier to maintain.

[Davew]

Our communal pool was heated but the system broke down about 6 years ago requiring replacement.  We had some quotes for a replacement heater which were considered too expensive (think is was around 9,000 Euros). Solar panels were investigated but not deemed cost effective.  
On top of the replacement expenditure the cost of the electricity and paying someone to cover/remove the cover overnight to conserve the heat it was never replaced.

[bedouin]

On top of the replacement expenditure the cost of the electricity and paying someone to cover/remove the cover overnight to conserve the heat it was never replaced.

The solar-heated outdoor pool I mentioned in Vera Playa isn't covered at night.