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Serving The Greater Fresno Area Since 1970

Serving The Greater Fresno Area Since 1970

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Donald P. Dick Air Conditioning Blog

Does Your Home Need Ventilation? You’ve Got 4 Options

Your home’s ventilation can make a big difference in the air quality indoors, as well as health issues affected by air quality. According to the federal EPA, indoor air can be much more polluted than outside air, and considering how much time we spend at home, it’s no wonder that improving indoor air quality can help with asthma, allergies and overall health

The main types of ventilation are natural, spot, whole-house and attic.

Natural ventilation occurs when you open your home’s windows and doors and through unintended air leaks in the exterior envelope. In our climate, it’s fine to rely on fresh air to keep the air clean during our moderate fall and spring weather. However, during the summer and winter, many homeowners keep their homes tightly sealed for efficient heating and cooling.

Spot ventilating equipment includes kitchen and bathroom fans that whisk out odors and high humidity. Even though these fans are small, they remove surprising amounts of indoor air and do help freshen indoor air, as long as they’re vented to the outdoors. Some kitchen range hoods do not vent to the outdoors, but only pass the air through a filter, which doesn’t do much to improve indoor air quality.

Whole-house ventilation systems work with your existing forced-air HVAC equipment. These systems either force air out of your home or bring it in. Some kinds do both, and they’re called balanced ventilating systems. Other types exchange the thermal energy of the air leaving your home with incoming air (or vice-versa for cooling), lowering your conditioning bills; these are called heat or energy recovery ventilators.

The last kind of ventilating system is for attics. Building codes require some attic ventilation to prevent the growth of mold and to ensure that attics don’t get excessively hot in the summer. Homes with attic fans cost less to cool in the summer because a cooler attic will see less heat energy radiating down into the living spaces.

Whole-house and attic ventilation systems improve air quality and comfort. If you would like to learn more about your ventilation options, please contact us at Donald P. Dick Air Conditioning. We’ve provided top-notch HVAC services for the Fresno area for more than 40 years.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in the greater Fresno, California area about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems).

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