One of the best ways to lower energy costs, create a healthier environment for your family, and increase the life of your HVAC system is to condition your attic.
If your heating and air system is in your attic, then conditioning that space is very beneficial. Let’s break it down. There is nothing inherently wrong with a traditionally ventilated attic. Air moves through the soffit and up and out of vents at, or in, the ridge. This system works well and has worked for hundreds of years.
The Problem WITH YOUR AVERAGE ATTIC:
If the “lid” (meaning the ceiling) below the attic is not properly air sealed from attic to conditioned space below, you are introducing extreme hot or cold attic air (depending on the season) into your conditioned space below. This puts a lot of stress on your HVAC system. The fix is to air seal below the roof sheathing. This can be done many different ways. Remove all existing insulation above the ceiling. Spray foam the underside of the roof deck with 10” of open cell foam.
This design works well in our climate. It creates a continuous Yeti Cooler-type seal around the entire attic space. We would also “condition” the attic by adding supply air from our Heating and Air system. Now what you have is an attic space that is part of the conditioned space below. This will keep the attic temperatures within 5-7 degrees of the temperature of the home.
Keeping your system in these types of temperatures as opposed to the extreme colds in the winter and extreme heat in the summer inherently extends the life of the HVAC system. Even though you are now heating and cooling more space, your system is not working as hard to try and combat the extreme temperatures of the ventilated attic.
The most important correction is that your family is no longer breathing the dirty/dusty attic air. Instead, the air is now “controlled” by your system. We all know what an old attic looks like; imagine breathing in that air. Taking “control” of the air our clients breathe is one of the most crucial “systems approach” that we as a company believe in.