Stop Energy Bills and Home Comfort from Going through
the Roof
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When winter sets in, homeowners rush to close
up their homes -- the one thing they think will keep
them comfortable during an uncomfortable season. Storm
windows are hammered in place, drafts are sealed and
the heating is cranked up. What homeowners don’t
realize is that this can affect the ventilation in your
home and, as a result, send your family right to the
doctor with sore throats, runny noses and breathing
problems.
But help is at hand. With American
Standard’s 3 Cs of Comfort, you can quickly keep
your energy costs and your health in the comfort zone
all winter.
The 3 Cs of Comfort -- check,
control and clean -- is an easy way to remember the
critical steps needed to winterize your home for your
health and your wallet. And by following these simple
steps, you can ensure optimum comfort during the winter.
“Heating, ventilating and
air conditioning (HVAC) is one of the most important
components of a home,” explains Paul Trotter,
vice president of sales, American Standard. “But
homeowners often do not realize that HVAC is the driving
force in delivering home comfort and clean air. Now,
with the 3 Cs of Comfort, consumers have the information
they need to prepare their home and their family for
a comfortable, healthy and money-saving winter.”
Here is how to winterize your
home using the 3 Cs of Comfort:
Check: Even if you think your
HVAC unit is working fine, it is important to schedule
proactive maintenance at least twice a year. Typically,
it is a good idea to schedule an appointment for an
HVAC professional to perform system maintenance in the
fall and then again in the spring. If you are shopping
around for a new HVAC unit, ask the installer to conduct
a heat-loss heat-gain calculation of your home before
making a purchase. This will help ensure your new air
conditioning and heating system is the proper size for
you and your home.
It is easy for winter winds to
creep inside your home and for heated air to leak out,
so check for potential problem areas. Your windows and
doors are prime suspects when it comes to infiltration
and leakage. Check around every frame for cracks, gaps
and poor-fitting fixtures to make sure they are sealed
properly. If they are not, use caulking or weatherstripping
to seal the cracks, gaps and poor-fitting fixtures.
You can pick up both for just a few dollars at any hardware
store.
Also make sure your home is adequately
insulated. This will help keep the warm, comfortable
air inside. American Standard suggests the following
R-values, which represent the thickness of insulation:
R-30 in the ceilings and R-13 in the exterior walls.
Control: During the winter months,
when outdoor temperatures drop, moisture in the indoor
air typically escapes through any crack or crevice in
the outside wall of your home, especially around windows
and doors. Moisture is also exhausted outdoors through
bath and kitchen fans. This makes the humidity level
of the indoor air increasingly low. If this is a problem
in your home, you may notice static electric shocks
and the drying of nasal passages as well as changes
to your woodwork, furniture and plants. But you can
control this issue by purchasing a whole-home humidifier
with automatic control.
Do you feel like you are constantly
adjusting the temperature of your home? Let the thermostat
do all of the work for you. By programming your thermostat,
you will be in control of your own comfort. A lot of
today’s better models can be programmed to run
at different temperatures throughout the day, depending
on your comfort needs over a 24-hour period. Most manufacturers
recommend 70 degrees for cold winter climates. Also,
if you have ceiling fans with reversible motors, the
overall comfort of your home can be improved. When the
fan blades are reversed in the winter, this pushes the
comfortable, heated air down into the room.
In the winter, the temperature
in the home changes rapidly because most furnaces heat
the home with a single-stage heating system, which delivers
a blast of warm air followed by an off cycle and then
another full blast of warm air, causing very noticeable
temperature swings. You can even out the temperature
with an American Standard two-stage heating system.
The first stage operates more than 80 percent of the
time for continuous comfort and only switches to the
second stage when more heat is needed. Clean: Believe
it or not, the air inside your home can sometimes be
more polluted than what’s outside, causing potential
problems for your family’s health. Changing the
air filter in your HVAC unit is one of the easiest --
and often most overlooked -- steps you can take to improve
the air quality inside your home. It is a good rule
of thumb to change the air filter every 30 days. To
help save on replacement filter costs, some manufacturers,
such as American Standard, have cleanable filters that
can be rinsed or vacuumed. The company also helps manage
air quality with its Comfort-R technology, which is
found in furnaces. With this technology, fan speeds
are reduced, allowing more unwanted particles -- dust,
pollen, pet dander and the like -- to cling to the filter
so cleaner air can flow into your home.
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