Some facts about air circulation and dust buildup in the wintertime.
Home is more than where the heart is: for most of us, home is where our lives begin. It’s where we dream our biggest dreams and plan our biggest undertakings. All over Michigan, home is where we take our deepest, most satisfying breaths. To keep those deep breaths healthy and free it’s important to take steps to keep dust under control while air circulation is lessened by the winter cold.
Why poor indoor air quality can lead to a sneeze here, a cough there
It’s winter in Michigan. And while there might be a little difference from county to county on who gets more snow, you can bet that nobody has their windows open much these days. Along with that comes the itchy dry skin from cold winter air, and the unwelcomed build up of dust. In the warm seasons, you’ll open windows and let the fresh air push the dust right out of the house. This isn’t always possible in the winter months. So, you’re more likely to experience the sneezing, coughing, watery eyes, and other symptoms that can come from irritated allergies and just plain old stale air.
Big city, small town, or old country road, dust is out to get you...
We think of dust as just the fine particles of dirt that come into the house from outside. This isn’t the whole picture: dust is actually made up of all kinds of things: Skin cells, hair, fibers from clothing and carpeting, crumbled leaves from fall clean up, even the paint from your walls and ceilings adds to the problem. Beyond the effects on your health and comfort, there is also the strain on the electronics and appliances in your home. The build up of dust in computers can cause problems that you don’t want. You might expect that your furnace and HVAC systems are working hard to remove the dust from the air in your house, and you’re correct. However, months of removing dust particles from the air can actually cause a damaging level of buildup in those systems, which increases the likelihood of problems down the road.
Fight back against Dust 💪
There are steps you can take that will help control the build up of dust. These things will help you whether you live in the city, and have loads of traffic stirring up particulates from busy streets, or if you live in an old house out in the country and have dirt roads covering everything in a fine coat of dust every time a neighbor drives by.
Our bedding and linens trap dust more than other things in our house. Simply by washing sheets and blankets often, using a vacuum on our carpeting and window treatments and keeping our tile and wood flooring swept and mopped can reduce and keep dust in check.
Your ventilation system is already helping you. You already know about the filter that cleans the air as it moves through your ducts and is heated by your furnace. Every furnace has a recommended timetable for replacing the air filter to keep the dust build up from causing the air in your home to become less clean and to help protect your ventilation system from the damage of dust build up. Some heating and cooling systems have more than one place where an air filter is used to trap unwanted particles from moving around your house.
Using these methods can help keep the quality of your air, and time spent in your home, much higher this winter until the warm weather comes back and you can open up those windows and start your spring cleaning.
Now is a great time to schedule a Clean & Check from Dean Mechanical to make sure that all your ventilation machinery is working perfectly and that every deep breath of that indoor air is the cleanest it can be.
