Don’t Shortchange Proper HVAC Design in Your New Home
It’s a good idea to have a basic idea of proper HVAC design when purchasing a new home or doing an HVAC installation in a new or older Cincinnati home. This is an immense investment in the value of your home, not to mention your comfort and financial welfare. It’s crucially important to get it right the first time.
Characteristics of good HVAC design
Energy-efficiency
Choose energy-efficient equipment from a respected HVAC manufacturer, sized specifically for your home and its cooling and heating loads.
Get the size wrong, either on the big or small side, and you will face a variety of avoidable problems, including
- wasted energy,
- uneven cooling and heating,
- higher than necessary energy bills,
- and poor humidity control and dirty air,
- among many others.
A system that’s under-sized, especially, will be more vulnerable to breakdowns than otherwise.
Proper ventilation
Good HVAC design calls for a continuous exchange of dirty indoor air with fresh outside air. This can be accomplished with a combination of natural and mechanical ventilation.
These days, with residential construction much more focused on creating a tight environment with as very little energy waste, it’s absolutely necessary to have effective ventilation. The alternative, a closed system with inadequate air exchange, is unhealthy and uncomfortable.
Balanced ventilation systems, aka Energy Recovery Ventilators and Heat Recovery Ventilators, do the best job of ventilating a home, exchanging heat and moisture between parallel air streams for optimum comfort and energy efficiency.
Exhaust fans in bathrooms and the kitchen are also essential components of reliable ventilation. Along with natural ventilation (opening windows and doors when the outside weather allows it), these are some of the main methods for ventilating a house. However, a variety of other mechanical strategies are available.
A professionally designed air distribution system
You want a system with a network of ducts and registers that delivers conditioned air effectively and efficiently, and then circulates it back to the central heating or cooling equipment with as little air loss as possible.
Beware of home construction that doesn’t include a return vent in every room that has a supply register (or at least addresses that issue with other measures).
Effective humidity control
This should fit the climate of the area where you live, and be designed to handle seasonal changes and extremes.
In Southwest Ohio, humidification is desirable during the cold, dry winter months, while the opposite is mandatory during the hot, muggy summers. Whole-house humidity control is more effective and convenient, if you can afford it. Portable humidifiers and dehumidifiers can be effective for controlling humidity in rooms or single levels.
Design that ensures clean air
A properly designed residential HVAC system should utilize efficient air filtration in the central forced-air equipment, and if necessary, with a dedicated whole-house air cleaner or purifier.
Other strategies may be necessary as well, including an ultraviolet (UV) light filtration system.
These are the main strategies for effective HVAC design in a residential setting. Discuss ways to accomplish these goals with one of the best HVAC contractors in Cincinnati.
It also should be mentioned that good HVAC design goes hand in hand with effective home weatherization. This includes a tightly-sealed home and the right amount, type and location of insulation in the house.