Everyone, I have a building in Fairbanks Alaska that uses hot water
heat. I built an energy model for it and included a gas, natural draft,
80% efficient boiler to heat the hot water. I then deleted the gas hot
water boiler and substituted a steam meter. I repeated this process for
the gas DHW heater. When I ran the steam heat meter energy model, I
noticed that the Heating Energy Consumption was reduced by 38% compared
to the gas energy model. Nothing else seemed to change much, but the
reduction of heating energy bothers me. I realize that a steam to hot
water heat exchanger is more efficient than a boiler, but why does the
amount of heating energy required drop so much? Shouldn't the amount of
heat required be the same for both models? I have attached the Energy
Consumption reports for both models. Thanks.

Kathryn Kerns