The Following Is How Moisture Impacts Your Indoor Air Quality

Posted by Andre & Erika Lacroix on
Indoor Air Quality | Nashville, TN | EZ Breathe Ventilation System

The Following Is How Moisture Impacts Your Indoor Air Quality

Moisture is a good thing. When the air in the home is too dry, it can feel stale. It can also dry up your skin and leave your eyes and throat feeling itchy and dry. Dry air can also make it easier to catch flus, colds and other respiratory infections.

Indoor Air Quality | Nashville, TN | EZ Breathe Ventilation System

This doesn’t mean moisture is always a good thing. Too much moisture can also be dangerous to your health and the state of your home.

High humidity and indoor air quality

High moisture levels can diminish your home’s indoor air qualityin many ways:

  1. High humidity levels can leave your home feeling too warm and stuffy. The high moisture levels in the air prevent the sweat on your skin from evaporating and cooling your body. You’ll continue feeling hot and sweaty even when you’re in your home.
  2. Turning on the air conditioner won’t improve matters one bit. It’s much harder to cool air with high humidity levels. You’d have to turn your air conditioner really low to begin to feel any effect.
  3. High moisture levels will also threaten your health by providing ideal conditions for the growth and propagation of mold and mildew. Mold spores are allergens. They can also cause other illnesses, especially for those with compromised immune systems.

The solution

Dealing with high humidity levels requires a combination of various solutions for the best results. These include:

  1. Installing a dehumidifier

This will work in conjunction with your HVAC system to control the levels of humidity in your home. You can ensure your home is comfortable and reduce the amount of energy required to heat or cool the home.

Indoor Air Quality | Nashville, TN | EZ Breathe Ventilation System
  1. Installing a whole-home ventilation system

Many people shut their doors and windows then turn on their HVAC systems to keep their homes cool in the summer. This, however, results in the humid stale air being recirculated. The result is a humid home.

A whole-home ventilation system ensures that the stale and humid air within the home is expelled to the outside of the home. Fresh air is then brought into the home.

  1.  Waterproof your basement

The state of the air in your basement affects the indoor air qualityof the rest of the home. Waterproofing your basement ensures that the basement remains dry. This in turn keeps humidity levels in the home low.

Keep an eye on the levels of humidity in your home for the sake of your health and comfort.

Contact the Professionals at EZ Breathe Ventilation System Today! 866-822-7328

Written by Andre & Erika Lacroix

We are a 2nd generation family owned and operated business that has been working in homes with basements and crawl spaces for over 40 years.  We have been waterproofing and sealing about 500 foundations a month during that time as the largest Waterproofing contractor in the Midwest with 15 locations servicing 8 states.

20 years ago we would seal a foundation and recommend a standard dehumidifier to address the additional water vapor (humidity in the air) inherently found in below grade environments, such as basements and crawlspaces.  Back then, dehumidifiers were the industry standard to help with this problem. However, many of our customers were looking to us as the “foundation expert”, asking…

“What else do you have? I really am not getting results with this messy, expensive dehumidifier. My foundation is dry, walls are dry, floor is dry, so why does it still smell and feel like a basement?” 

We needed to find something better. Our company’s core values include offering world class customer service to every customer, every time.   So, we challenged our Research and Development department to find a real solution for our customers to combat not only the moisture, but also the odors, pollutants and unhealthy environment our customers were concerned about. We found, tested and installed a ventilation product for a period of three years. We private labeled that product as the EZ Breathe Ventilation System. The feedback in those first three years from our customers, as well as our installation crews, did not live up to the standard of quality to be included in our waterproofing process that offered a life time warranty. Once again, we needed something better.

We valued not only the results, but what we were learning from our customers. So, we went back to the drawing board, took matters into our own hands and made quality improvements to that first generation ventilation unit.

Our own EZ Breathe Ventilation System was born…reengineered, redesigned and much improved! We quickly learned that our crews were thrilled with the quality improvements, ease of operation and installation, but more importantly, our waterproofing customers loved the new, improved EZ Breathe unit as well.

Their feedback told us the air in their basements and crawlspaces felt better, but their entire home was benefiting from their EZ Breathe as well. We received countless letters thanking us because their whole house felt different, less odors, fresher air upstairs too, family members were feeling better, needing less allergy medicine, husbands were no longer snoring, children were no longer coughing as much, the home and it’s family were living healthier lives!

It was time for us to move beyond simply offering this innovative technology to just our waterproofing customers. Our passion and commitment to helping people improve their indoor air environments is what drove us to incorporate EZ Breathe Ventilation Systems as an independent company in 2003. We strongly believe that homeowners everywhere deserve a healthy indoor air quality.

We have spent the last 20 years dedicated to learning about the relationship between our home and our health; indoor air quality, the home as a system, building science and how it relates to indoor air quality as well as the challenges our modern day practices pose to the quality of air we breathe in our homes.