Much of your time is spent inside your home where you feel comfortable and relaxed. Your HVAC system plays an important role in creating an ideal environment to enjoy your family, friends, hobbies, and favorite activities. Honey's Air & Solar helps you achieve this goal by providing residents of Modesto and surrounding communities with heating, air conditioning, and solar solutions. One aspect of interior comfort that is often overlooked by homeowners is indoor air quality.
Indoor Air Quality and Your Health
Pollen, dust, pollutants, odors, chemicals, and other airborne irritants are not isolated to outdoor air. These same concerns inside your home and the effects such pollutants cause can be greater inside than outside. Your home is a closed space and does not have the benefit of wind and air currents to carry away airborne irritants. It is a closed system, and what is inside your home is circulated throughout the structure via your HVAC system. Health issues that are triggered by poor indoor air quality are allergies, respiratory issues, and asthma. If you have chronic lung conditions, such as bronchitis or COPD, the symptoms are worsened by poor indoor air quality.
Signs That You May Have an Indoor Air Quality Issue
Poor indoor air quality causes physical symptoms and visible signs. Physical symptoms of poor indoor air quality include:
- Congestion
- Trouble sleeping and fatigue
- Runny nose
- Watery or irritated eyes
- Chronic bronchitis
- Symptoms linked to respiratory illnesses
Visible signs of poor indoor air quality are:
- Dust build-up on your furniture and cabinets
- Carpets and floors that need to be swept more than one time per week
- Dirt built up around windows and doors
How to Improve Indoor Air Quality
Your HVAC system is designed to circulate clean air throughout your home. If you have signs of poor indoor air quality, here are some steps to take:
- Change or upgrade your HVAC filters
- Upgrade your HVAC
- Have your HVAC system checked by Honey's Air & Solar
- Schedule HVAC maintenance services and duct cleaning with Honey's Air & Solar
- Install products to improve air quality inside your home
Choosing the Right Indoor Air Quality Products for Your Home
Honey's Air & Solar offers several types of products for improving indoor air quality. Changing filters is typically the first step we recommend. Your filters may be dirty, or you may need to upgrade to HEPA filters to trap smaller airborne particles. We typically recommend filters that are rated as MERV 11 or MERV 16. MERV is the minimum efficiency reporting value that indicates how well the filter captures airborne particles based on the size of the particles. When you have a higher-rated MERV value, the filter is designed to trap smaller particles compared to lower-rated filters.
How to Use MERV Ratings to Choose HVAC Filters
HVAC filters are rated from one to 20. Ratings between one and four are designed to capture the most common airborne particles, such as dust mites, fibers from carpets and textiles, pollen, and chemicals released from any spray products. These types of filters work for most households. Higher-rated filters may be better if you notice indoor air quality issues through either visible signs or physical symptoms.
Products to Boost Indoor Air Quality
For some households, HVAC filters do not provide adequate improvement for indoor air quality. In these cases, Honey's Air & Solar recommends whole-house air purification systems. We carry the Lennox PureAir and PureAir S systems. The systems are designed to capture 99 percent of airborne particles, dander, and mold as small as 0.3 micron that significantly reduce indoor air quality and eventually enter your lungs. The systems also trap 90 percent of viruses and bacteria as small as 0.1 micron, such as the viruses that cause colds, flu, and MRSA. For chemical vapors, the systems trap up to 50 percent of volatile organic compounds released by cleaning products, paint, carpet, and other household items.
If you have signs of poor indoor air quality inside your home, now is the time to consider your options. Honey's Air & Solar in Modesto has the solutions that you need to improve indoor air quality within your budget. If you realize that you have other issues besides poor indoor air quality, we also perform heating and cooling repairs and installation. Call us today to schedule a time for one of our technicians to come by and perform an indoor air quality evaluation and outline how we can help.
