Humidity for Comfort (And Energy Savings!)
Few people realize that dry air feels cool to the skin, and fewer yet understand why. Everyone, even those whose activity is very limited, loses heat energy to the surrounding air. Heat energy takes two forms.
Your warm body at 37°C/98.6°F, in contact with room air at, for example, 23°C/75°F, heats that air by convection and radiation. The air takes the heat from your body and keeps you cool. That’s called sensible heat transfer.
Latent heat transfer takes place when moisture on the surface of the skin evaporates. The heat for the evaporation is also taken from your body, cooling you further.
Air is like a sponge, it soaks up moisture from wherever it can. Dry air soaks it up very well. When that moisture comes from your skin, it cools the skin, and you feel cool, often cold. So you set the thermostat up until you feel comfortable. Using up even more heating energy. On the other hand, raising the moisture level of the air, the relative humidity, decreases the rate of evaporation, and you feel comfortable at a lower temperature setting. So that’s humidification for Comfort and Economy — turn the humidistat up, the thermostat down, and save on the gas bill!
Humidity for Health
One of the most common dysfunctions that plague our society is dehydration. Most of the tissue in the body is composed of water. If it loses the water, the tissue drys up. The elasticity goes, and with it function declines. Besides dry skin, the symptoms of dehydration include chronic joint and muscle pain, raspy throat, sore eyes, and lack of mental concentration.
There are two ways to combat dehydration, and both are essential; drink lots of water, and maintain the relative humidity in the home and office at comfortable levels. With our society’s current concern for wellness, this is the very first avenue of approach.
Health Canada recommends that your home’s relative humidity should be kept between 30% and 55% in winter. Lower levels aggravate skin allergies and respiratory infections, and higher levels increase the spread mold, bacteria and viruses. Dust mites spread when the humidity is above 50%. Experts at the Association of Heating, Refrigeration, and Air Conditioning Engineers in Atlanta say medical studies indicate that maintaining your home’s humidity in this optimum zone inhibits the survival of such viruses as cowpox, influenza, measles, polio, and herpes.
Humidity for Your Home (and More) — Shocking!
Maintaining the proper relative humidity in your home can help protect your investment. Dry air results in warping and splitting of furniture, woodwork and hardwood floors. And wooden instruments, such as Woodwinds, Strings and even Pianos, loose pitch and can be prone to cracking and warping as well, sometimes permanently disabling the instrument. A properly humidified environment can help diminish the chance of permanently damaging your precious woodwork and instruments over the long term.
Another scourge of dry air is static electricity. If you want to avoid the zap! every time you touch a light switch, or if kissing a loved one puts a spark in the relationship you didn’t intend on, it’s time to turn up the humidity. Static discharges can also be genuinely harmful to various electrical components, especially the many sensitive computers and home stereo systems that occupy today’s home.
