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Your Home, Your Comfort, Your Health by Brandon Owens

Spring is officially here. Another winter has passed and finally its time for baseball, blooming flowers, and evening walks. There is nothing like the thought of Spring to make us think about fresh air, cool breezes, clear water, and sparkling fresh dew. Everywhere you look you can see the signs of new life. Freshness seems to be in the air. But there are other things in the air too. Pollen, bacteria, dust and other allergens are there. You can’t see them but they are there. And you may be surprised to know that they are more likely to be in the air in your home than in the air outside. According to studies conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), in many cases, your indoor air has a good chance of being more polluted than the air outdoors.

The problem is that many homes today are constructed virtually air tight to conserve energy costs. All winter long your heating system warms your home recycling air throughout your house. The majority of mold spores, bacteria, and dust can’t escape. Spring, you might start thinking, offers the best solution: open windows. But that fresh air contains allergens, dust and bacteria. And if you close all your windows, seal your house up tight and turn on the air conditioning then you have the same problem of recycling the inpure air throughout your home. With most Americans spending a majority of their time at home indoors it makes sense to find the best way to make your home as healthy and comfortable as possible.

Here are some of the problems and situations you may be facing from unhealthy air or an inadequate home comfort system:

Families with children and pets should be particularly concerned with the quality of their indoor air. Children are generally more susceptible to the ill effects of poor indoor air quality. Pets only add to the problem. Sure they are a part of the family but their dander, hair, and the dirt and other contaminants they collect on their body when outdoors only adds to the impurities in your indoor air. We have talked about indoor air quality, discussed its negative effects on your indoor environment and identified some warning signs of poor indoor air quality. So where do you go from here?

To combat poor indoor air quality you could stop breathing, but we think that is a pretty drastic measure. You could also keep all your pets outside, wash your kids hands incessantly, dust every day, and wear dust masks. But realistically, some of us like the company of our pets, realize how difficult it is too keep active kids squeeky clean and free from germs, and don’t have time to dust every day. And who wants to wear a dust mask? Also, many of the impurities found in your indoor air can’t be combated by simple techniques. It requires a strategy, an indoor air quality strategy. It requires systems that prevents mold, dust, and bacteria from forming in your home comfort systems and that will combat the impurities that are naturally in the air.

Below we will discuss a strategy for improving your indoor air quality, the products we recommend to achieve good air quality and their specific attributes. The end goal will be a system designed to improve your indoor air quality and enhance the healthiness and comfort environment of your home.

Concern:     Airborne germs, particles and dry air.

Strategy:     .......Zap airborne germs.
                     .......Trap airborne particles.
                     .......Moisturize parched air.

Product:      Honeywell Enviracaire Elite Air Quality line.

Ultraviolet Air Treatment System        Zap

Bacteria and mold spores. They’re nasty. So you wash, wipe, and clean. But they still can blow through the air in your home every time your heating and cooling system’s fan runs. That’s not all. Your air conditioner’s moist cooling coils can serve as an ideal breeding ground for mold, a known allergen. But there’s help: an Enviracaire Elite Ultraviolet Air Treatment System.

Return-air duct models. Mounted in the duct-work of your heating and cooling system, the Ultraviolet Air Treatment System continuously emits ultraviolet (UV) energy that kills a high percentage of airborne bacteria passing by the light. Honeywell uses special UV lights that don’t produce ozone, unlike most UV products.

Coil irradiation model. Mounted above your central air conditioner’s cooling coil, the Ultraviolet light continuously bathes cooling system components with mold-stopping UV energy.

UV Air Treatment products by Honeywell feature a unique design with a patent pending lamp drive system for maximum performance, a special safety design that won’t let bulb light unless properly mounted to the duct, and a special light pipe to safely view the bulb operation.

Whole-house Air Cleaner        Trap

Indoor air can often be more polluted than the air outdoors. What can you do? One important element of your overall strategy to improve air quality is to filter the air in your home with a whole-house air cleaner. It filters impurities from the air that passes through it. Honeywell offers a range of whole-house air filtration options, so there’s a model that’s right for you. They work silently while your system runs to improve your home’s air and increase your comfort and peace of mind.

Whole-house Humidifier        Moisturize

Warm dry air acts like a giant sponge, soaking up moisture from everything it touches. No doubt about it, air that’s too dry can take a toll on your family. Your home can suffer too. Parched, thirsty air literally sucks the moisture out of your home’s woodwork and furnishings, leaving them cracked or dried out.

Fortunately, replenishing the moisture in your home’s air is easy. Enviracaire Elite whole-house humidifiers add needed moisture—safely, efficiently and automatically. An Enviracaire Elite humidifier helps protect your home’s wood furnishings and contents, too. The National Wood Flooring Association and manufacturers of wooden musical instruments, such as pianos, recommend using whole-house humidifiers. Honeywell offers a range of humidifier models to meet your home’s particular needs. Plus, Enviracaire Elite humidifiers are easy to maintain. Just replace the humidifier pad once a year. No tools are needed.

Concern:     Stale air, airborne particles, odors and carbon dioxide.

Strategy:     The Perfect Window.

Product:     Honeywell Perfect Window Fresh Air Ventilation System.

For health and comfort, your home should have one complete fresh air exchange every three hours. But if your home is tightly weatherized, it can take as long as 10 hours for one air exchange! Opening a window is one way to get fresh air. But you can get fresh air without letting in allergens and losing energy savings. The answer is the Honeywell Perfect Window fresh air ventilation system.

If your home is like most, it has been built tight for energy efficiency. Unfortunately, tight homes allow little fresh air to get in. Or stale air to get out. Which means that odors linger and mildew flourishes. Without fresh air, your home may not only feel stuffy and uncomfortable, but you and your family can feel tired and listless. What's more, excess moisture can become trapped inside, condensing on the windows, warping expensive woodwork and cabinetry.

Ventilation is one of the best solutions to indoor air quality problems. Ventilation allows stale air to be flushed to the outdoors, and replaced with an incoming stream of fresh outdoor air. One simple example of ventilation is opening a window inside your home. The problem with this, of course, is that it is not always a practical solution in the middle of winter. Not only will bringing in the frigid outdoor air make you uncomfortable by causing temperature variations, it will also cause your heating system to work overtime by trying to compensate for the changes in temperature. So, in an ideal world, we would be able to dilute stale indoor air by bringing in fresh outdoor air, without sacrificing energy savings and comfortable temperatures.

Honeywell’s ventilation system will allow you to retain energy used to hat or cool your home. It will also allow you to adjust your fresh air flow. The heart of the system is a heat transfer core that transfers heating or cooling energy from outgoing to incoming air streams. Both heat and moisture are transferred. The Perfect Window system can be connected with your heating and cooling system or it can stand alone. This gives you maximum flexibility in the use and location of your system.

All Honeywell Information was taken from Honeywell’s website at www.honeywell.com/yourhome.

Concern:     Harmful particles, bacteria, gases and odors that breed infections and aggravate 
                        allergies, asthma and emphysema.

Strategy:     Whole-house air cleaning system.

Product:     600 Hepa Shiels by Pure Air Systems, INC.

The Hepa Shield, unlike other whole-house filter options operates on its own blower and motor and is attached in a by-pass configuration. In most cases it increases performance and reduces energy costs. The Hepa Shield is effective in removing the following particles, odors and gases:

The Hepa 600 is an effective means for removing harmful small particles from your indoor air.

Information taken from Pure Air Systems, INC.

Concern:     Carbon Monoxide poisoning.

Strategy:      Maintenance and warning devices.

Product:    Thomas R. Owens Maintenance Contract and Carbon Monoxide detector.

Carbon Monoxide poisoning is deadly and it doesn’t discriminate. It is a serious danger that many people take light heartedly until it’s too late. Although everyone is at risk from this silent killer, children and the elderly are most vulnerable too its harmful effects. The best strategy to avoid carbon monoxide poisoning is to use preventive maintenance and warning devices. If you are in our service area we can provide you with a preventive maintenance contract that includes a bi-annual inspection of your heating and cooling system. We can also install carbon monoxide detectors throughout your home. If you are not in our service area we highly recommend that you contact a reputable Home Comfort Specialist or Heating and Air Conditioning contractor in your area and discuss what services they offer to prevent carbon monoxide poisoning.

March 20, 2001
This article was written by Brandon Owens.
It is the property of Thomas R. Owens, LLC.