When Mike Gill built some laser cutters a while back, he didn't dream he'd eventually convert them into laser welders to create the nation's first Netherlands-designed high-efficiency solar water heaters.
Gill and his brother, Dennis, own Grandville-based Digital Tool & Die, a company founded 20 years ago to create metal stamping dies for the automotive industry. A year ago, the company diversified into machining parts for the military. Now it has rolled a half a dozen patented solar water heaters off the line and next week will produce another 50.
"The best solar panels on the market pull between 40 and 60 percent of available sun energy, but this one pulls greater than 90 percent," Mike Gill says. "In The Netherlands, when they build a new house they dig a hole, usually under the garage before they build the garage, line it like a swimming pool and fill it with 12,000 gallons of water. They heat the water using these panels and send the heated water through the in-floor heating system to heat the whole house all winter. And that's without electricity, fuel oil or natural gas."
Gill says The Netherlands receives 20 percent less sun energy than Michigan, so he knows the solar water heater will work here. Each panel costs about $900; in Michigan, it would take 10 panels to heat an average sized home. To produce hot water only, the system would need three panels, a heat exchanger and a water tank.
"We have school districts looking at these, especially for heating pools because it doesn't require a heat exchanger," Gill says. An estimate for one of the schools predicts a savings of $4,000 per month.
Digital Tool & Die will sell the systems through Tecumseh, Michigan-based Verwater Environmental, LLC and looks to establish distributorships nationwide.
Source: Mike Gill, Digital Tool & Die
Deborah Johnson Wood is development news editor for Rapid Growth Media. She can be contacted at [email protected].
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