Accurate Home Inspection of Atlanta        www.findmeaninspector.com                 404 680-4578

TEMPERATURE : When it's cold outside, your mission is to prevent as little heat as possible from leaving your home, because anytime it leaves, you have to pay to replace it. The price you pay is reflected in your monthly heating bill.There are two physical laws which affect how well your home hangs onto its heat.

Temperature Gradient- Heat moves from warm areas to cold areas. Pressure Gradient- Warm air moves from high pressure to low pressure.
 
HOW HEAT LEAVES YOUR HOME-  Thermal Bridging
The living space is warm and it's cold outside. Materials that conduct heat will try to radiate warmth from inside the home to the outside, just like... a radiator! Solid materials like concrete and wood are better radiators than materials like insulation, which is filled with tiny air pockets.Solid materials offer better thermal bridging, allowing heat to move more easily from the warm inside to the cold outside, except in this case, better is worse. Building methods which minimize thermal bridging help save on heating costs.

You Change the Air Pressure
When you turn on a fan in a bathroom, above a stove or in a laundry room, you are pushing warm air out of the home through the fan vent. Whenever anything in your home burns fuel such as wood, propane or natural gas, combustion takes place. Since the products of combustion are poisonous gasses (and moisture), those gasses are vented to the outside, along with warm air from the home.Low air pressure is created in a home when air is removed either by using a fan or by creating a strong draft using the combustion process. Since the air pressure is lower in the warm house, air will come in to replace it... cold air. Nature Changes the Air Pressure-Blowing wind will create areas of high and low pressure around your home, pushing and sucking the warm air out and replacing it with... cold air.

Stack Effect-As cold air enters the home and is heated, the warm air rises and leaves the home through vents in bathrooms and laundry rooms and through cracks and airspaces in and around ceilings.This rising heat loss is called stack effect. As warm air leaves the home through stack effect, it's replaced by cold air.

Are you serious about how to go about cutting your heating and cooling costs?  

Follow these steps:

• Where appropriate, improve the insulation and air sealing in your home.
• Use this guide to help you decide what kinds of changes to your heating and cooling systems will be right for you.
• Consult with a registered heating/cooling contractor and your fuel supplier before making a final decision.
  

Heating Units and Controls
There are four common types of heating units:

• A furnace provides heat through a forced air distribution system.
• A boiler provides heat through a hydronic distribution system. (Hydronic systems are also referred to as hot water systems.)
• A space heater supplies heat directly to the room where it is located.
• A heat pump extracts heat from the air, ground or water outside the house and usually delivers it through a forced air distribution system.

Most heating systems need air for combustion. Furnaces, boilers and space heaters that burn fuels need a supply of air to be able to burn properly, and a vent to the outdoors so that combustion gases can escape from the house. Electric heaters do not need to be vented. Combustion is a two-step process: air in, and gases out.  

Curtis Petty

The building Inspector Code Enforcement Professional Certification Program adopted by the Association provides a means of gaining recognition of the competency levels acceptable for  inspection responsibilities and improved professional standing in the community.