Football Season is Back; Here are Some Tips on How to Keep Your Cool

Football Season is here and with that comes indoor entertaining. Even inviting over a couple friends and their families can easily add another 10 people into your home. That many new, warm bodies can instantly heat up your home and cause your air conditioner to work overtime. Here are a few things you can do to keep your cool without cranking up your HVAC.

See Also: Football Goes Green With Energy Efficient Stadiums

Use your Fan

Whether you have a whole house fan or small portable one, use it. This will circulate the air throughout your home, bringing the cool air from other rooms into the kitchen or den where there are more people. The use of the Whole House fan will also create tunnels of cool air coming into your home. To get the most out of this method, open a basement window a crack and an upstairs window wide open. This will pull the cool air from below and up to the upper floors where heat naturally rises. You will quickly get the hot air out and cool air in. If you have a ceiling fan, set it to run counter-clockwise and at a higher speed. Just don’t forget to switch it back to clockwise for the cooler months.

See Also: How to Get the most Benefit From Your Fan

Use Your Cooler to Its Full Potential

If you use a drink caddie or drink trough, set it in front of the fan or vent in your home. This will send the cool air radiating off of the ice directly to the people in the room. No open coolers handy? You can substitute a bowl of ice. This is great for cooling a single room for a limited amount of time, at least until overtime.

Love Your Windows

Can’t afford new, energy efficient windows?  Invest in window treatments. Typically, 30% of the unwanted heat in your home is coming in through your windows. Once the heat is in, it is trapped and cannot escape, like the greenhouse effect. Keep the curtains or blinds closed during the day. On west- and south-facing windows especially.

See Also: Do Windows Impact House Temperature

Grill Out

Using your grill instead of your oven will dramatically lower the temperature in your home. Keep that oven warmer on is also not helping with the escalating temperatures. Most recipes can be adapted to using an outdoor grill, so keep that unwanted heat outside during gameday. When it is already 100 degrees outside, who wants to preheat their oven to 400°?

See Also: Lower Your Energy Bill This Summer

Change Your Filters

We talk about this often, but change your filters. You should change your home filters every 4-6 weeks for normal use. By keeping your filters clean, air can circulate better and more efficiently in your home. When you don’t and there is buildup on the filter, your HVAC or fan has to work that much harder to push the air through your home.

See Also: Are All Air Filters the Same

Open Doors

You may think by closing off parts of your home during these hot months, you are conserving energy. In fact, the opposite is true. By shutting off vents or keeping doors shut in rooms not often used, you are making your HVAC work harder. These vents are designed to allow maximum air flow through your home. By closing them at your whim, they are now prohibiting that air from leaving and will change the pressure in the rest of the vents. Shutting doors will keep the air in those rooms cooler while the rest of the home is trying to keep up.

See Also: Should You Close Doors in Unused Rooms

Exhaust Fans Are Your Friend

In a crowded home, heat is an issue, but so is this newly added humidity. By using your bathroom air vents, you are not only getting rid of the warm air, but also any excess humidity from your guests. Don’t worry about the energy costs from this either. Bathroom fans are such simple devices that they use very little energy.

See Also: The Forgotten V in HVAC; Ventilation

Consider Your Lighting

Replacing Incandescent lighting with more energy efficient lighting will conserve much more energy and keep your home cooler. If you can’t run out to the store between now and game time, limit your use of these lights. For example, for a 100-watt light bulb, the lightbulb can put out 100 units of light or 100 units of heat. No matter what form, the energy will be released. Most of these lights only use 2.1% for light. The remaining energy is turned into heat.

See Also: LED Lightbulbs and the Impact on Your HVAC

Maximize Your Air Conditioner

The more efficient your HVAC is, the better it will run. Installing a programmable thermostat will increase efficiency in your HVAC unit immediately. Rather than you fiddling with the temperature every time you are uncomfortable; this smart technology will do it for you. There are so many choices on in the market now for these thermometers. Contact one of our technicians to find out which one would be right for you and your home.

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So, put on your team jersey, fire up the grill and keep your guests happy by following these useful tips.