The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many people to work remotely, perhaps indefinitely. If you’re working from home, you’re probably using your HVAC system more to stay comfortable, especially in Clermont, FL’s hot, humid summer.
After all, being comfortable is important to keep your productivity levels up. However, you don’t want to keep your energy bills up too.
How can you maximize your AC efficiency while you work from home so you can be comfortable without driving up your energy costs? There are ways to increase your AC unit’s efficiency and improve the overall air quality in your Clermont home while you work remotely.
The Importance of a Comfortable Home Workspace
You’ll be more motivated and more productive in a comfortable workspace. While the lighting, your desk, and your chair are certainly important, you might not have thought about the temperature or air quality in your home workspace. However, you should.
In the hot Clermont summer, you’ll need a comfortable temperature to work in. If it’s too hot, you may feel tired and sleepy and have trouble concentrating. With cool, fresh air, you’ll be more alert.
Turn on Your Fans
Ceiling fans are great for lowering your cooling costs. With both a summer and winter setting, ceiling fans improve your home’s overall air circulation year-round. However, you’ll especially appreciate the enhanced coolness of moving air in the baking Clermont summers. A floor or desk fan will also help.
Fans circulate the air around your workspace and throughout your home, so the cool, fresh air distributes more evenly. It also means your AC doesn’t have to work as hard. When you leave the room, you can switch off your fan to save energy.
Keep Your Surfaces Dusted
Keeping your surfaces dusted helps you maintain higher indoor air quality, and if you have asthma or allergies, it can reduce flare-ups.
Moving things around on a dusty surface stirs the dust into the air again. However, regularly whipping your work surfaces down takes the dust out of circulation. Removing dust from circulation also means it won’t end up clogging your AC’s filter, which increases your AC’s efficiency.
If you notice you have to dust frequently, you could have dirty HVAC filters or dirt in your ductwork. An HVAC technician can evaluate your system and recommend how to fix it.
Invest in a Mini Split Installation
If you are working from home by yourself, or it’s just you and your spouse in a few rooms, you don’t need to keep your entire house at air-conditioned temperatures. All you need is to cool a couple of rooms, which is more efficient than cooling your whole home.
How do you cool just part of your house? Consider investing in a mini-split installation. You can keep your workspace cooler and not pay to cool the entire building. A mini-split installation is also a good option if you have an older property in Clermont with an HVAC system that may be less reliable than you’d prefer.
Explore Indoor Air Quality Services
Good indoor air quality is just as important when working from home as a comfortable temperature. Some devices for improving your indoor air quality make your AC run more efficiently by removing dust and pollutants from the air. A good HVAC company can recommend which indoor air quality services are best for your Clermont home, such as an air purifier, replacing air filters, or installing UV lights.
The Benefits of an Air Purifier in Your Home Workspace
An air purifier in your workspace is beneficial, especially if you work in a small space or share a room, because fresher air keeps you more attentive and focused while you work.
An air purifier supplements your AC’s performance because the purifier cleans the air that goes through your AC’s filter. It prevents pollutants from endlessly circulating in your home’s air and helps your AC run efficiently.
Air purifiers with HEPA filters are especially beneficial if you suffer from asthma or allergies. HEPA filters are particularly effective for air filtration. They trap 99.9% of small, harmful particles like mold spores, smoke, or pollution.
Other benefits of air purifiers include:
- A reduction of harmful chemicals indoors
- The neutralization of unpleasant odors
- A decrease in the spread of airborne illnesses
- Improved sleep quality
Given that the Environmental Protection Agency has reported indoor air can be much more polluted than outdoor air, having an air purifier in your home workspace makes sound business sense.
A Reduction of Harmful Chemicals Indoors
Like your office at work, your home workspace is full of things that give off invisible chemicals. For instance, furniture varnishes, upholstery, paints, glues, and various plastics can give off chemicals. Some of them can be harmful, particularly with prolonged exposure.
The filter on your air conditioner won’t filter these out of your home workspace, but most air purifiers will.
The Neutralization of Unpleasant Odors
When the Clermont summer is going full blast, you probably keep your AC on and your windows and doors tightly closed. While this keeps you cooler and more comfortable, it doesn’t do much to freshen your home’s air.
If they aren’t filtered out or carried away by a breeze, odors accumulate in your home and make it smell musty or even a little funky — and no one wants that in a workspace!
All your AC does is circulate the air; it doesn’t clean it like an air purifier. That’s because an air purifier is designed to trap particulates and odors and create fresher air.
A Decrease in the Spread of Airborne Illnesses
HEPA air purifiers can trap airborne viruses and bacteria. While they won’t trap and kill every airborne pathogen, they supplement good hygiene habits and help keep you healthier while you work from home.
Improved sleep quality
Breathing better quality air throughout the day as you work or at night when you sleep leads to a better night’s sleep. If you sleep better, you’ll be more focused, alert, and productive during the day when you work.
The Benefits of Timely Air Filter Replacements and Maintenance
It’s important to regularly change the filters in your HVAC system, including your air conditioner, as part of routine maintenance performed by an HVAC technician. Regular maintenance on your AC also keeps it running more efficiently and increases its lifespan.
Your AC’s filter keeps your unit from getting clogged and gummed up with dust and other pollutants. When your AC unit is dirty, it works harder.
When your AC works harder, it uses more energy and increases your energy costs. Also, it causes more wear and tear, which means your unit will wear out faster, need more frequent repairs, and may even need emergency AC repair service.
The Benefits of Germicidal UV Lights in Your Home Workspace
Air filters are great at filtering large particles that might otherwise contaminate your AC unit; however, they aren’t able to trap smaller particles. UV lights (also known as ultraviolet germicidal technology) can eliminate the following contaminants from your air (and keep them out of your AC):
- Cigarette smoke and other foul odors
- Bacteria and viruses
- Mildew, fungus, and mold
An indoor air quality services technician can install UV lights in your home’s ductwork or by your AC’s evaporative cooler.
If you need emergency AC repair or indoor air quality services in Claremont, FL, don’t go with just any “HVAC technician near me” you find on the internet. Instead, contact the trusted professionals at Global Cooling to see how we can improve your home workspace.