While controlling the temperature in your home is extremely important to comfort and energy efficiency, there are other aspects that are also essential. Factors that affect home comfort include temperature, humidity, indoor air quality and the capability to control these things. If you understand how these four factors work together, you can enhance home comfort while saving energy.
Temperature
This probably seems like a no-brainer; you control the temperature by turning the thermostat up or down. But there's more to it than that. While you can set the temperature of the thermostat, it won't necessarily control temperatures elsewhere in the house, such as in a finished basement or upstairs bedrooms. A zoning system can help you better control temperature throughout your house.
Humidity
Even if the thermostat is set right where you want it, you'll still feel uncomfortable if humidity is too high during the summer. And during the heating season, excessively dry air won't feel that great either. A well-maintained central A/C should control humidity, but if it doesn't, your comfort will suffer. In this case, you'll probably want to consider a whole-house dehumidifier.
Indoor Air Quality
Home comfort also takes a hit when indoor air is stale or dirty. Contaminants in the air can irritate your eyes, nose and lungs, and create a foul smell. Poor indoor air quality can trigger or exacerbate allergies and respiratory issues.Several strategies are available to clean indoor air, including removing or mitigating the sources of indoor pollution like using a fresh, high-efficiency air filter in your HVAC system, investing in a whole-house air cleaner, or employing affective mechanical ventilation.
Control
A modern programmable thermostat, equipped with humidity control will allow you to influence and control the other factors.
For more information on factors that affect home comfort, please contact the pros at Air Assurance. We're proud to provide reliable and quality HVAC and plumbing services to the greater Tulsa area.
Our goal is to help educate our customers in the Tulsa and Broken Arrow, Oklahoma area about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). Credit/Copyright Attribution: “kurhan/Shutterstock”