In the era of ever increasing utility bills and shrinking storage space, tankless water heaters seem to be all the rage. Let's take a minute to discuss the benefits and disadvantages of going tankless.
Conventional water heaters require a great amount of time and energy to warm. Tankless water heaters provide instant, unlimited access to hot water. In fact, when installed at each hot water faucet, tankless water heaters can be up to 40% more energy efficient than the conventional water heaters and run at 99% efficiency (while brand new conventional heaters are at 80%).
This article appears in Dec 2-8, 2000.