6) Does the heat gain benefit the pool water?

Of course! It has the ability of protecting the heating of your pool water from your heating system plus raises the water temperature by 10-40% and also increase the ambient air temperature by 15-25 degrees. Don't forget about the protection from leaves dirt and other falling debris. We have projects in mountains that have shown 70-80 degrees inside the enclosure when the sun is out and the outside is under 40 degrees. There are a lot of environmental conditions that can change this projection however.