Roughly 8.4 million Canadians suffer from allergies each year, and many allergens lurk in their homes. Believe it or not, your home’s heating and cooling system plays a critical role in managing those allergies. This guide explores the link between allergies and the air, how maintaining your HVAC system impacts air quality, and some tips for maximizing your HVAC system’s role in allergy control.

Allergies and Air 101

Many allergy triggers are airborne and affect the respiratory system causing congestion, sneezing, itching eyes and more. The allergens and other contaminants that your air contains are examined and controlled through indoor air quality (IAQ). While all atmospheric air contains some allergens, the strength of allergy response often correlates as much with the concentration of contaminants as it does with the specific allergens. Therefore, working to improve your home’s air quality helps reduce your allergy responses.

How HVAC Maintenance Impacts Air Quality

While most people think of their HVAC system as temperature control, it more broadly controls your home’s air. The following are the primary ways an HVAC system influences air quality.

Air Circulation

Your HVAC system circulates air around your home by drawing it in through the return vents, creating negative air pressure, while pushing out air through the supply vents, creating positive air pressure. This pressure differential circulates air through your home, allowing the air filter to effectively remove airborne contaminants. Regular HVAC maintenance helps protect your system’s air circulation by preventing airflow restrictions and ensuring it moves the right air volume.

Contaminant Concentration

Your HVAC system has an air filter to keep the airborne contaminants out of the system and prevent airflow restrictions. A secondary benefit is that the filter captures potential allergens, removing them from your home’s air and reducing its allergen concentration.

Additionally, the air moving through the system will deposit small contaminants on critical parts of your system, like the circulating fan and in the ducts. If left unresolved, these deposits allow circulating air to pick up small allergen particles and circulate them back out into your home.

Humidity Control

Humidity plays an incredibly important role in managing your home’s allergens. High humidity, which is common around Nanaimo, creates an environment that allows mould and other spores to thrive. Conversely, when it’s too low, airborne contaminants stay in the air longer because they are lighter. Some materials, like wood and leather, are more prone to release additional particles into the air when they’re dry.

Your HVAC system helps provide some humidity management. However, neglecting maintenance may inhibit the system’s ability to condense moisture from the air.

Maintenance Tips for Maximizing HVAC Allergy Control

Some of how you interact with or neglect your HVAC system impacts how well it helps control your home’s IAQ. Consider the cooling and heating maintenance your system needs to maximize how it aids in controlling allergens in your home.

Inspect and Change Your Air Filter Regularly

Maintenance starts with keeping an eye on your system’s air filter and changing or cleaning it regularly. For central systems, begin by setting a reminder to check your filter every month and gently vacuuming the intake side to help remove loose contaminants. The frequency of needing to replace the filter will vary based on the filter size and your home’s air quality. Generally, the common 2.5-5cm filters need replacing about every 30 to 90 days. Larger 7-10cm filters may last four to six months, and 12-15cm filters may last up to a year.

Ductless mini-split heat pumps have reusable filters in each air handler. These need cleaning about every two weeks. When cleaning them, make sure they are completely dry before replacing them into the air handler to prevent an environment for mould and mildew to grow.

Keep Your Ducts Cleaned

Dust and other contaminants will make their way into your ducts. As the air flows through, it may pick up some of these particles, returning them to your air. Further, as the contaminants build up, it will restrict airflow through the system.

Ideally, have your ducts cleaned and sealed every three to five years to make sure there’s no build-up or cracks in the system that can release allergens into rooms. However, you may need duct cleaning if you’ve had water or smoke damage to your home. Additionally, you may want to consider duct cleaning as part of home improvement projects that create a lot of dust inside. Finally, you may want to plan to clean your ducts more frequently if you have pets, cook frequently, smoke or vape indoors, or have an inside hobby that produces a lot of dust.

Get Professional HVAC Maintenance

Professional HVAC maintenance includes a deep cleaning of the system, including the heat exchanger, evaporator coil and circulating fan wheel, among other components. Additionally, the maintenance technician will run tests to ensure the system is circulating the proper amount of air. This includes testing the circulating fan wheel and the level of refrigerant in an air conditioner or heat pump. All of this works to ensure the system is working efficiently, which helps protect air circulation, your system’s air throughput for filtering and its ability to condense humidity from the air.

It’s best to plan for two maintenance visits every year. The visit in the spring should focus on the air conditioner and the second one, typically conducted in the fall, focuses on the heating system.

Add Humidity Control

If your system is properly maintained and you’re still finding that it’s not controlling humidity well, you may want to consider adding a humidity control device, typically a dehumidifier for homes around Nanaimo. Depending on your home, you may want to consider a whole-house dehumidifier that attaches to your home’s HVAC system. The goal is to keep the humidity level between 30% and 50%.

Make Repairs Quickly

While repairs are not part of a routine maintenance visit, completing repairs is just as much a part of regular HVAC maintenance as the preventative visit. A component that isn’t working properly strains the entire unit, preventing it from effectively heating or cooling your home or managing your home’s humidity. Many times, issues with your HVAC system may mean that it’s not circulating air effectively, which reduces the amount of air moving through the filter. Whether you notice a problem or a technician uncovers one during maintenance, work to resolve it quickly.

Contact Us Today

Residents around Nanaimo who want home services they can trust turn to the team at Twin Peaks Plumbing, Heating & Gas. Our experts provide heating and air conditioning maintenance, repair and installation, indoor air quality solutions including purifiers, UV lights and humidity control, duct installation and cleaning. This takes in a wide range of residential plumbing services. These include water heater installation and repair, backflow detection, drain and sewer inspection, cleaning and repair, leak detection, sump pump installation and repair and bathroom and kitchen fixture installation.

Call to schedule a consultation with one of our indoor air quality experts to explore the best ways to improve the role that your HVAC system plays in allergy management for your family.

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