Indoor Air Quality
Maintaining Indoor Air Quality to Not Worsen Asthma Symptoms
It’s common for people to worry about the air they breathe outside. However, the air inside of homes is just as important, if not more so. Clean air has a direct link to healthier bodies. Although you want everyone in your house to benefit from clean air, this is especially important for anyone who lives with asthma. If you have concerns, consider using professional home duct cleaning services.
Hidden Dangers
Okay, so maybe you don’t notice any kind of unpleasant odor. However, unless you use residential air duct cleaning services on a scheduled basis, there’s a good chance that you have hidden dangers in your home. If you’re curious why home duct cleaning services make the difference, consider some of the things that accumulate inside the ductwork.
- Pet Dander
- Insect and Rodent Droppings
- Dust Mites
- Mold and Mildew
- Dirt and Debris
Every time the air-conditioning system or furnace kicks on, either cold or hot air gets pushed through the ducts. Whether lingering in the air or landing on surfaces, such as furniture, countertops, and floors, you and your family inhale these contaminants. Residential air duct cleaning services eliminate other risks such as perfumes, tobacco smoke, and household cleaners.
Targeted Health Risks
Poor indoor air quality can compromise anyone’s health or make an existing condition worse. However, this is a particular risk for anyone with asthma. What happens is that symptoms, including coughing, wheezing, and shortness of breath, intensify. That alone is reason enough to hire a reputable source for residential duct cleaning in Toronto and anywhere in the GTA.
If you have a loved one in your home with asthma, then you know all too well that attacks are frightening. You also understand that asthma isn’t something to mess with. Unfortunately, this condition sends thousands of people in North America to the hospital every year. Even worse, roughly 5,000 people die annually because of asthma.
An Ideal Solution
The most effective and efficient way to improve the indoor air quality in your home is to use professional home duct cleaning services. Armed with years of experience, vast knowledge, and cutting-edge equipment and tools, a qualified technician will eliminate whatever’s inside the ductwork. That same expert can set you up on a schedule to maintain the clean air.
Along with using a company that provides residential duct cleaning in Toronto and anywhere in the GTA, you can take a few precautionary measures. For instance, switch to organic or natural household cleaning products. Limit the use of perfumes, hairspray, and other aerosols. Also, use a dehumidifier to prevent mold and mildew.
We Specialize in Clean Air
City Duct Cleaning is a leading source for residential duct cleaning in Toronto and anywhere in the GTA. To create a healthier, safer, and more comfortable home environment, give us a call.
What Do We Mean by Indoor Air Quality?
If you do not understand the meaning of “indoor air quality,” you will after reading this. When hiring air duct cleaning for your home, you end up with improved indoor air quality. With the right air duct cleaning equipment, an expert will eliminate contaminants found inside of the ductwork. If you are asking, “Are there any good home duct cleaners near me?” the answer is yes, but you should still conduct research to find the best company.
In simple terms, “indoor air quality” refers to the quality of air within any structure and relates to several things, such as the comfort in which you and your family members live and everyone’s overall health. The fact is that many airborne contaminants, including dirt, debris, and chemicals, cause health problems.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, indoor air is as much as five times more polluted than the air outside. Of all the environmental health risks, indoor air pollution ranks among the top five. The problem is that you may have no effects from breathing in contaminated air until years later, which is why having your home’s ductwork cleaned on a regular basis is so critical.
Beyond the pollutants mentioned, there are other concerns, including mold, mildew, pollen, dust mites, bacteria, viruses, pet dander, and rodent and cockroach droppings. For instance, if you have rats or mice running through your ducts, they leave behind urine, which is an incredibly potent airborne allergen. Not only do dust mites feed on dander and human skin cells, they are also one of the worst biological sensitizers known, meaning that virtually everyone is allergic to them.
Unless an expert eliminates these contaminants from your home’s ductwork, they become airborne whenever your air conditioning or heating system operates. As air from the HVAC system pushes through the ducts, it blows the contaminants into the air that you and others in the home breathe. When indoor air quality is poor, people show such symptoms as headaches, runny nose, fatigue, dizziness, and throat irritation that they shake off as nothing more than cold.
If someone in the home has COPD, asthma, bronchitis, emphysema, or some other upper respiratory problem, these contaminants wreak havoc on the body. Dirty air ducts can also lead to long-term and more severe problems, including chronic respiratory disease, cancer, and heart disease.
At City Duct Cleaning, our team of professionals will use state-of-the-art air duct cleaning equipment to improve the indoor air quality of your home dramatically. Please visit our website or call us today for assistance.
The Air Our Children Breathe Is Literally Killing Them
The air our children breathe might not be as clean as we once thought.
Each year, nearly 600,000 children die from diseases caused by air pollution, and even more children live in areas where the risks of developing such diseases are incredibly high. According to a new report from UNICEF, 300 million kids around the world are breathing in toxic air every day.
This constant contact with air pollution is especially dangerous for children because their bodies are still developing. Toxic particles found in the air can make their way through the bloodstream and cause cardiac disease, asthma, pneumonia, or even heart failure.
The United Nations is actively working toward reducing the number of deaths caused by air pollution by limiting fossil fuel emissions and ensuring that children receive the healthcare that they need. But the issue of air pollution is not something that can be solved overnight.
Your Indoor Air Quality
Indoor air quality should also be of concern as recent studies have proven that indoor air quality is generally worse than outside air quality.
Sometimes the effects on indoor air quality can be sufficient to cause people to experience significant discomfort, and in extreme cases to become physically ill.
There are several ways that you can improve the indoor air quality in your home or workplace.
Professional duct cleaning and upgrading your air filtration systems are usually the first steps to be taken in the process. If these items are done properly, it is possible to notice amazing results. These items can completely solve your indoor air quality concerns most of the time.
There are exceptions and possible next steps. Adding HEPA air filters to your living space can make an immediate and very noticeable improvement to the air that you and your family breathe every day.
How the air duct cleaning job is done is crucial. Do not shop for this service based on price alone. The cheaper companies often do not have the proper tools or technique to do the job correctly, nor will they spend the required time on site to do a thorough job.
How To Tell When You Need Duct Cleaning
If you see dust on your furniture or experience things like moldy odors, dirty air filters, clogged cooling coils, musty closets, smoky rooms and dirty vents, these are all signs that your ducts need cleaning.
Read more about this in our post titled: How To Tell When You Need Duct Cleaning.
Ebola Virus and HVAC Systems
With news of a recent outbreak of the Ebola virus in Africa, and fears that it has already spread to some areas of the United States, it would be prudent to warn anyone who may be concerned about their indoor air quality that there is currently no product that the HVAC industry offers that will reduce the spread of Ebola.
There are many excellent air filtration systems available, such as HEPA filtration units and Ultra Violet (UV) systems that kill mold, bacteria and odors, but they just have not yet made such a system that could kill off any disease that is transmitted by bodily fluids or by human contact.
A veteran’s administration hospital in Puerto Rico is ordering the emergency installation of multi hepa filters in the ward’s return air HVAC ducting to create an emergency Ebola quarantine ward.
This situation is considered an emergency and prompt attention is required. Delaying repair will create a situation where an outbreak of Ebola may happen to patient, guest or employees.
What they’re concerned about, is that there is going to be airborne Ebola in the ward, and the air ducts are going to suck it into the HVAC system and its going to spread it around to the rest of the hospital.
There are other experts who claim that HEPA filters are only good down to .3 micron sized particulates but the ebola virus is as small as .02 microns in size so it won’t really work.
So if you can’t be sure that you can entirely eliminate the virus from an HVAC system, what is the average person to do? At a minimum, avoid direct contact with infected people and incorporate regular hand washing using soap and water.
Additional information from the FDA… Unfortunately, during outbreak situations, fraudulent products claiming to prevent, treat or cure a disease almost always appear. The FDA monitors for fraudulent products and false product claims related to the Ebola virus and takes appropriate action to protect consumers.
•There are no approved treatments for Ebola available for purchase on the Internet.
•Experimental Ebola vaccines and treatments are in the early stages of product development, have not yet been fully tested for safety or effectiveness, and the supply is very limited. A claim that a product prevents, treats, or cures a disease requires prior approval by FDA.
•Consumers are warned to beware unapproved products sold online and in retail stores claiming to prevent or treat the Ebola virus and other conditions, such as cancer, autism, Parkinson’s and heart disease. Consumers who have seen these fraudulent products or false claims are encouraged to report them to the FDA.
Carbon Monoxide Detectors Now Mandatory In Ontario
Carbon Monoxide detectors are now mandatory in all homes in Ontario.
Carbon Monoxide (CO) is a toxic gas that is odorless, tasteless and invisible.
CO is produced when fossil fuels burn incompletely due to insufficient oxygen. Fuels that can cause CO include natural gas, propane, kerosene, gasoline, coal, wood and charcoal.
Unlike smoke, Carbon Monoxide mixes evenly with the air. It is not necessary to have a CO detector installed on every floor of your home, but should be located where it would be most likely to wake you up if a dangerous situation were to suddenly occur. A typical home may have one installed upstairs in the hallway outside the bedrooms, and if there is a bedroom or sleeping area in the basement, then you should have one there too.
CO detectors come in battery-operated portable models, or can simply be plugged into any 120 volt electrical outlet. They may also be hard-wired into your home, and in this case they would normally be installed on the ceiling. Since CO does mix evenly with the air in your home, it is not crucial that your CO detector be installed on the ceiling.
Portable CO detectors need to be re-calibrated at least once every 5 years. If your’s is older than that it would be prudent to replace it.
There have been news articles in our area in recent history about people dying in their homes due to carbon monoxide poisoning, and I’m sure you have heard about this happening. We have a customer who’s carbon monoxide detector woke up their family at four o’clock in the morning. They called the Fire Department and they told him it was because of his furnace.
His gas furnace was only 12 years old but had developed a crack in the heat exchanger. He called us early in the morning and we are able to install a new furnace for him that day. He took the opportunity to upgrade to a high-efficiency model. Lucky for him and his family that they did have that carbon monoxide detector. There’s proof right there that they do save lives.
