Houses today are constructed with energy efficiency in mind. This entails added insulation and tightly sealed doors and windows to keep energy costs affordable. While this is great for your energy costs, it’s not so good for your indoor air quality.
Because air has fewer chances to escape, contaminants can increase and impact your residence’s indoor air quality. In fact, your house’s air can actually be 2–5 times more polluted than the outdoors, according to the EPA. That’s not good for anyone, but it’s particularly detrimental for family members with allergies, asthma, other respiratory concerns or heart disease.
Let’s discuss some of these routine contaminants and how you can improve your residence’s indoor air quality.
When you picture pollutants, you may think about smog or tobacco smoke. But lots of substances that impact your air quality are common substances. These things include chemicals called volatile organic compounds, or VOCs.
They entail:
Other everyday pollutants include:
Some people are more affected by VOCs than others. The EPA says symptoms of VOC exposure entail:
In bad instances, the EPA says VOCs can lead to respiratory and heart diseases.
It isn’t hard to enhance your residence’s air quality. Here are a couple of ideas from Harvard Medical School:
Frequently cleaning and washing surfaces that attract allergens, such as furniture, carpet and bedding, will help decrease on dust, dust mites and pet dander in your home.
This essential filter keeps your home comfortable and air fresh. How often you should change your air filter depends on the kind of filter you use. Flat filters should be replaced monthly, while pleated filters should be replaced every three months. If you’re unsure if your filter should be replaced, remove it and hold it up to the light. Get a new one if you can’t see light through it.
If someone in your home deals with allergies or asthma, we suggest having a filter with a better MERV rating. The bigger the number this is, the better your filter is at removing contaminants.
Keep fresh air circulating by opening windows whenever the temperature allows. We also suggest running exhaust fans in your bathroom and kitchen frequently to get rid of pollutants and introduce more fresh air.
From whole-home air purifiers, Matz-Rightway has a solution to help your household breathe better. We’ll help you select the ideal option during your free home comfort assessment. Reach us at 631-406-9220 to schedule yours now!
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