Category: Indoor Air Quality

Unless your hire NASA to spring clean your house the way they do the inside of a space ship, you can pretty much count on spreading dust and dirt around, thus negating at least some of your hard work.  And that’s true even if you have a high-end vacuum cleaner. You see, even while your vacuum cleaner is “ingesting” dust, dirt, and more, it’s also spreading some of it around – along with pollen, dust mites, and bacteria – with the aid of high-speed carpet brushes and your vacuum’s exhaust. All that “stuff” will then settle on your just-cleaned furniture [...]

It probably sounds a little odd, but at least in one sense, you’re better off living in an old, drafty house vs. one that’s sealed up tight as a button. Tightly sealed homes, with little fresh air circulation, give rise to “Sick House Syndrome.” That’s when the inhabitants are susceptible to all sorts of indoor air pollutants that simply have nowhere else to go except inside your lungs. How do you know if you have an indoor air quality problem?  These are the usual warning signs: • Frequent headaches • Dizziness • Nausea • Chronic achiness • Inability to concentrate [...]

Funny thing about home heating systems.  You see, no matter how much comfort they bring your way, they’re equally capable of delivering heaping doses of misery, too.  How can that be?  Well, unless you have some way to add humidity to your home during the heating season, you’re susceptible to all kinds of maladies, including dry skin, itchy eyes, static electrical shock, aggravated symptoms of allergies and asthma – and we’re just warming up. So what’s a body who to do, one who likes it warm and not overly dry?  Here are five simple yet effective ways to add humidity [...]

Improving the quality of your indoor air isn’t just for people who suffer the ravages of upper respiratory problems.  It’s also a good way to help decrease the incidence and severity of seasonal allergies and colds and flus while ridding the air of chemical cleaner byproducts, radon, pesticides, dust, bacteria, and umpteen other known indoor air pollutants. So how does one go about accomplishing such a feat?  Here are three very effective techniques. Keep the floors clean: So many of the pollutants we struggle with find their way indoors on the soles of family members’ shoes.  Hence, the need and [...]

If your house, at times, is more humid than the inside of a fish bowl, chances are you and other family members are feeling some sort of ill effects. Anything from problem allergies and asthma to mold and mildew build-up to higher than normal home cooling costs. None of that stuff is any good or very good for you, so the idea is not get rid of all humidity, but to get your home’s relative humidity level just right. And the absolute best way to do that during the warm weather months is a with a whole-house dehumidifier, professionally installed [...]

With the heating season already in full swing, chances are your indoor air is considerably drier than it was even a month or two ago. No surprise there: warm air from a heating system takes moisture out of the air which, in turn, leads to a certain amount of discomfort and inconvenience from the likes of static electricity, dry skin, dry hair, nose bleeds, and even dried up wood floors and furniture. Sound familiar? Then here are several simple and effective ways to add moisture into the air, starting today! Invest in House Plants – You don’t need a green [...]