Closing Air Conditioning Vents In Winter

In a 2003 study the lawrence berkeley national laboratory discovered that register closing led to increased energy use.

Closing air conditioning vents in winter.

The issues your hvac experiences due to closed vents are like problems caused by dirty air filters including inadequate airflow turning off and on frequently and premature hvac breakdown. In fact it could even cause your energy costs to increase. This has resulted in a completely separate system from the forced air heating system different thermostats ductwork everything. The air handler and all ductwork are in the attic a 1 story house.

Homeowners typically close vents in an attempt to redirect air away from unused spaces. If you re going to pay to heat any air it might as well be the air in the rooms of your home. The belief is that closing a vent will simply push the air onward to other parts of the home improving energy efficiency. If it s not from the room it will come from cracks around doors or windows and other unwanted places.

Make sure that the seal between the air conditioner and the window is as tight as possible. Closing vents will also increase your monthly utility bill as your hvac struggles to keep up. Comfort issues remember a psc blower delivers less air the more vents you close. Researchers found that closing too many registers or more than 60 percent of those in a home resulted in air flow resistance problems that could damage an air conditioning system and potentially lead to costly repairs especially if the system s coils freeze.

Those systems are designed to move a certain amount of air and blocking lots of vents puts a restrictive pressure on the part of the system trying to move the air. That means your home will take longer to cool down or heat up. As it turns out closing air vents in a home with a modern central heating and air conditioning system does little to save energy. If you cannot close the damper do not use the window air conditioner.

Closing air vents is a popular strategy for adjusting air flow in the home but it s not necessarily a good one. If you have a portable air conditioner with a single hose typically vented out of a window do not use it in smoky. If you have a window air conditioner close the outdoor air damper. Close off the 3 basement vents in the summer time while leaving the rest of the vents in the house wide open and also closing off some of the vents on the upper level while leaving the other vents open in the rest of the house during winter time.

Your hvac system is designed to balance the pressure and temperature of air in your home. During heating season do i need to close off the ceiling vents a c to avoid having the hot air rise into the a c ductwork and loose. So we ve covered the most important problem with closing vents. The bigger issue that no one here has mentioned is that if you close off more than about 20 of the vents you risk damaging the heater air conditioner.

But there are a few other important problems closing vents can cause including.