Importance of Improving Air Quality

You do your best to make sure your home is comfortable to live in. You keep it clean, dusting and vacuuming. You have nice furniture and a good heating and cooling system, so you never have to worry about the ambient temperature. But have you considered the overall air quality in your home? Lots of things can affect the quality of the air you breathe and improving the air quality can make a huge difference in your personal health.

Effects of Poor Air Quality

Positive air quality is one of the main factors in your overall health and how you feel each morning when you wake up to face the day ahead. If you find yourself waking up with dry eyes and skin while experiencing a scratchy throat and clogged nasal passages, this could be because the air quality in your home isn’t up to standard quality. Poor air quality can also increase the symptoms felt while experiencing allergies or common colds.

Constant exposure to poor air quality will also increase the level of dizziness you feel while in the home, whether you are simply moving from one area to the other or participating in highly physical activity and this dizziness can actually induce feelings of nausea in some cases.

One of the best things you can do to assure that you feel your best year round is to purchase and install a whole house humidifier. Humidifiers go a long way in improving air quality in any space, and while you may have used a single room unit before and found it adequate, consider how important it is to your family that the whole house is protected from poor quality air. Take a look at what a whole house humidifier can do and why it’s essential for better air quality.

What Causes Poor Air Quality in the Home

You spend a good portion of your time giving your home a solid and quality cleaning each week while using an in-home air exchanger system. Although these are all good steps towards improving air quality, it might not necessarily be enough to maintain a good level of air quality. That is because most people are aware of what can actually cause poor air quality in the home on a daily basis. The following are some of the most common causes of air quality in the home:

• The presence of cigarette or wood smoke (fireplaces, wood furnaces).
• The presence of or condensation not only in visible areas but also in the hard-to-spot sections of the home.
• The types of scented and harsh chemical cleaners being used in all areas of the home during marathon cleaning sections.
• Pesticides, pollen and environmental pollutants from the outdoor atmosphere entering the home through open windows or the cold intake vents on your home.
• Inadequate ventilation throughout the home.

While installing a whole home humidifier (more on that below) is definitely a positive step in the right direction for improving the overall air quality of the home, you can also increase the air quality of your home by looking the abovementioned reasons for poor air quality. Checking out the above factors for possible contamination and taking steps to prevent these from entering the home can help you achieve the goal of a home with good air quality.

Why it is Important to Improve Air Quality in the Home

When you think of air quality, the first thing that comes to most people minds would be the air that they are breathing while outside of the home and in the elements of the outdoors. But air quality control needs to start in the home to ensure that a portion of your day is spent breathing in clean healthy air. Positive and high air quality in the home will have the following effects on the body and mind:

1. It will reduce the symptoms felt by those who suffer from allergies or the common cold on a frequent basis.
2. It will reduce the aggravation of respiratory infections or illnesses.
3. It will reduce the amount of dizziness and accompanying nausea felt by those who cannot breathe properly in the home.
4. It will reduce the risk of heart conditions such as angina, heart attacks and strokes due to low oxygen counts in the blood.
5. It will reduce headaches and tension throughout the body that can become worse during slumber as the body relaxes and takes deeper, fulfilling breaths.
6. It will reduce the risk of cataracts as you age by decreasing the amount of dryness and strain felt on the eyes due to poor air quality.
7. It will have an overall positive impact on your mental health when you do not suffer from physical issues on a daily or frequent basis.
8. You will experience a more restful and peaceful slumber, allowing the body to commence with restoration and repairing operations that come naturally.
9. It will increase the number of hours you sleep during the night – therefore increasing your overall physical health and improving your mental state.

How Does It Work?

There are two types of humidifiers that will take care of the whole house rather than just a single space. With a console whole house humidifier, you have the advantage of not needing to hire someone to install it. In fact, the way it works is very similar to the single space units. You have a tank that will have to be filled (less often than the small ones, but still every 3 to 4 days, most likely). You can port it around to find the best location to make sure your whole house is moisturized. You also have the ability to adjust it until you get the level right.

While console units are a less expensive solution, the better way to go is to have a whole house humidifier installed professionally. These hook into your home via the ductwork and the furnace, with the water being provided straight from the water line to the house. Unlike the consoles, you won’t have any filling or cleaning to do, which is necessary to keep the tank clean in the console unit. You don’t have to replace filters as you would with the console, and your whole house gets evenly distributed humidity automatically, just as the heating and cooling is even with a centralized system.

How a Whole House Humidifier Improves Air Quality

It’s important to know what a humidifier actually does to improve your indoor air quality, especially if you aren’t sure it’s worth the investment. There are plenty of benefits here, many of which you may not have considered.

•         Improved breathing – Dry air causes your nose, sinuses, and lungs to dry out. This can cause cracking in the nose and sinuses that lead to nosebleeds. In addition, your body will likely try to compensate for the lack of moisture by producing excess mucus. Then, you have problems with phlegm and congestion. Moisture in the air helps alleviate these problems, as well as coughing from a dry throat. This is especially so with people who suffer from asthma.
•         Softer skin – When the air dries out, so does your skin, causing it to itch and flake. Every little thing can irritate it, and you may even get a rash. Rather than using lotion over and over again, which can grow tiring, a humidifier will help by keeping your skin moist from the start, so you don’t have to worry about it.
•         Wood furnishings – Wood can crack and lose integrity as the air gets dry, and that can mean furniture looks old and dated, or it can even cause your furniture to be completely destroyed. By installing a whole house humidifier, you’re protecting your investments in your furniture.
•         Healthier plants – Houseplants don’t just thrive on being watered; the soil and roots need that water, but so do leaves and stems. That means that dry air causes them to wilt faster. You’ll find that putting in a whole house humidifier will keep them perkier. As an added benefit, healthier plants produce more oxygen, which means we breathe in more oxygen-rich air – adding to the quality of the air.

Conclusion

Improving air quality isn’t something that necessarily comes to mind when we think about our homes, but it’s essential to our comfort and health. In fact, we spend a great deal of time in our homes, much of it sleeping, and it can be difficult to sleep with all the air quality issues you may be exposed to. Installing a whole house humidifier can help reduce and even alleviate a lot of discomfort, including cold symptoms and other breathing conditions, and it will even help you sleep better, which leads to better health. Take care of your family in every way possible by considering just how much better your indoor air quality can be with the right amount of humidity and fewer particles and pollution in the air in your home.

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