Top Benefits of Installing an Energy Recovery Ventilator in Your Home

As pleasant as Orlando is, the summer heat and humidity can get a little oppressive if you don’t take steps to manage your home’s indoor climate. Installing an energy recovery ventilator (ERV) is one of the most effective steps you can take to keep your home comfortable. With one of these systems, you’ll enjoy:

• Higher indoor air quality for better health
• Improved humidity control for greater comfort
• Lower heating and cooling bills

Greater Comfort, Fresher Air

An energy recovery ventilator is a ducted, fan-powered whole-house ventilation system. Proper ventilation helps remove built up humidity from your home. By keeping your indoor humidity at around 50 percent in summer, you’ll feel cooler and discourage the growth of mold, dust mites and bacteria.

Ventilation is also necessary for clearing out the air contaminants most air cleaners miss, such as volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and traces of carbon monoxide (CO).

While all ventilation systems freshen the air, an ERV goes one step further. It contains a heat exchanger that transfers heat and moisture between the outgoing and incoming air streams. In summer, it removes heat and humidity from the incoming fresh air, making less work for your air conditioner. In winter, it does the reverse to avoid wasting your heated air.

An ERV lets in the least humidity of all ventilation systems, which makes it a great choice for our humid climate.

Superior Energy Savings

The fresh, cool air an ERV brings in helps reduce your home’s total cooling load. Installing an ERV can reduce the size of air conditioner you need by several tons. That’s good news if you’re planning on installing a new air conditioner because smaller models cost less to purchase.

Because dry air helps you feel cooler than humid air, having a good ventilation system to keep your humidity down reduces your reliance on your A/C. You can raise your air conditioner’s thermostat temperature to save energy or, on cooler days, skip the A/C altogether.

For more information on installing an energy recovery ventilator, contact us at Rinaldi’s, serving the Orlando area since 1969.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in Orlando, Florida and surrounding areas about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about energy recovery ventilators and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

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