Using A House Fan To Boost AC Efficiency

The biggest enemy of an AC unit is heat gain, which is a measure of how much heat enters your home during a day. Your home can heat up in any number of ways including the following: the UV ways streaming in through your windows, the heat absorbed by your roof and then passed into your home, the body heat given off by the people in your home, and the heat given off by cooking instruments while you are making your meals. Depending on the factors present in your home, your AC system may struggle to even keep up with heat gain. When this happens, you may find your AC system running for several hours after outside temperatures start to fall. To assist your heating system in cooling your house down, you should consider installing a whole house fan. 

A Description of a Whole House Fan

Unlike a ceiling fan or a standing fan such as you might buy at a store, a whole house fan is designed to vent heat out of your entire house. Thus, you cut a hole through the ceiling of your home into the attic so that the fan has a way to vent heat out of your home. If you open your windows when you turn the house fan on, it will pull cool outside air in even as it pumps the heat out of your home. 

The Benefits of a House Fan

Using a house fan can help you to save money in at least the following ways:

1. A house fan uses 90% less electricity than an AC unit. Using less electricity is good for the environment, but it is also good for saving money. 

2. A properly sized house fan can vent all of the heat out of your home and replace it with cool outside air in a matter of minutes. If you are baking or having a party, which could heat your home up very quickly, your house fan will continue to replace the warmth generate in your home with cool outside air every few minutes. 

3. Running a house fan through the night will help to cool the structure of your home, which can then act as a cool-temperature reserve to keep your home cool longer into the day, so you have less need to run your AC unit during the day. 

While you may need the help of a professional HVAC contractor, such as those at AAA Home Services, to install a house fan, it should quickly help you to reduce your cooling costs and thus pay for itself. At the very least, you owe it to your budget to look into whether a house fan could help you to keep your cooling costs lower.