Your home’s indoor air quality can really suffer in the summertime when the house is airtight. Fortunately, there are ways to improve indoor air quality by adding some extras to your HVAC system.
1. Electronic air cleaner. One of the main ways to improve air quality in your home is to add an electronic air cleaner. Such systems attach directly to your air cooling system and charge dust, germs and allergen particles so they cling to the cleaner’s filter before they can be circulated throughout your home with the cooled air from your air conditioning system. Since the air cleaning system attaches to your HVAC system, you don’t have to have a separate air cleaner for every room. One unit handles the entire house.
Advantages to an electronic air cleaner include less dust, more healthful indoor air and reduced allergens like pet dander and dust mites.
You can also add portable air cleaners as needed.
2. Filtration. Consider using a higher MERV (minimum efficiency reporting value) filter in your HVAC system. Filters with MERVs of 8 to 12 are well suited for the typical home and are known for doing just as efficient a job of filtering particles that lower your indoor air quality as much more expensive filters — and, they do not require modifications to your HVAC system to work well, as HEPA (high efficiency particular air) filters with a MERV of 17-20 do. Pleated filters do an effective job of trapping particles due to the extensive surface of the pleated filtering material. Also, the more pleats the filter has, the better the airflow.
If you’d like to explore upgrading your HVAC systems to improve indoor air quality in your Calgary area home, call Arpi’s Industries at (403) 236-2444. We’ve been helping Alberta homeowners with their heating and cooling needs for more than 50 years.
Our goal is to help educate our customers in Calgary, Alberta about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about indoor air quality and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.
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