Household nuisances come in all shapes and sizes: anything from leaky rooftops to dents and dings in your ductwork. But few of them are as hard to spot, or can cause the most potential damage, as radon. It’s a gas created by the breakdown of uranium in the soil: naturally occurring, but dangerous nonetheless. Here in Portland, OR, qualified professionals can test for radon in your home and help mitigate it if they find it. Here are 3 reasons to have your home radon tested today.
The Clean Air Act Blog: Posts Tagged ‘Portland’
What Steps Are Involved in an Air Conditioning Maintenance Plan?
Monday, July 27th, 2015If you own an air conditioner – and living in Portland, OR, you likely do – then it behooves you to schedule a maintenance plan at least once a year and maybe more often than that. These tune-up sessions will help prevent possible breakdowns by spotting big problems while they’re still small. In addition, a maintenance plan will help lower your monthly bills by helping you air conditioner function more efficiently. If you haven’t scheduled a maintenance session in a while, you should do so immediately. It will help it perform better and maybe cut down some of those high energy bills for the rest of the summer. Here’s a brief outline of the steps involved in an air conditioning maintenance plan:
Get Your Heater Checked Out Before the Summer Ends
Monday, July 20th, 2015Homeowners in Portland, OR don’t usually think about their heaters in the summertime. Not when high temperatures and higher humidity rightly put the focus on air conditioning. But cool weather will be here before you know it, and before it arrives, it pays to make sure your heating system is ready. A maintenance visit from a trained technician can do wonders in that regard, and getting your heater checked out before the summer ends can ensure that the fall and winter months are problem free.
What Happens When Refrigerant Levels in My AC Drop?
Monday, July 13th, 2015Refrigerant is a vital part of the air conditioning process, but few people truly understand how it works. Ideally, your air conditioning system keeps it on a closed loop, and levels shouldn’t go down at all. This flies in the face of popular perception, which suggests that air conditioners consume refrigerant like a car consumes gasoline. Nothing could be further from the truth. Accordingly, if an air conditioning technician simple adds refrigerant to your system, he’s not fixing the problem. You need a trained professional to locate the place where it’s leaking and seal it before recharging refrigerant levels. Knowing what happens when refrigerant levels drop can help explain the process better.
3 Things to Look for in Your Duct Cleaning Service
Monday, July 6th, 2015The ducts in your AC system move cool air from your air condition system into the various rooms and hallways of your house. Over time, a certain amount of dust will build up in your ducts, spreading throughout your home to lower the quality of air, and even clogging the ducts themselves in the worst cases. Here in Portland, OR, you can find plenty of companies that will clean the ducts for you. But before you pick up the phone, make sure you have the right team for the job. Here are 3 things to look for in your duct cleaning services:
Why Are Refrigerant Levels So Important to Air Conditioning?
Monday, June 29th, 2015Refrigerant is what makes air conditioning possible. It’s a chemical compound (the exact type and amount depends on your air conditioner) which shifts from liquid to gas at a comparatively low temperature and which pulls heat out of the surrounding air as it does so. Centralized air conditioners work by cycling their refrigerant through a series of valves and coils. The refrigerant is first shifted into a liquid state and placed under a great deal of pressure (bleeding heat into the air outside your home in the process), then enters an evaporator coil where it shifts back to a gas (pulling heat from the air outside the coil). With the air around the system cools, a fan then pushes it into your home.
3 Signs That You Need Duct Repair
Monday, June 22nd, 2015Ducts are a vital component in your household air conditioning system – transporting cooled air to the various rooms in your household – and because they don’t have a lot of moving parts, they rarely require repairs with the frequency that the main system does. That doesn’t mean that repairs aren’t needed sometimes, unfortunately, or that – considering the damp weather in Portland, OR – you don’t have to deal with potential issues like mold growth in your ducts. A good technician can repair most issues with your ducts, but you still need to be able to notice that there’s a problem before picking up the phone. Here are 3 easy-to-spot signs that you need duct repair.
How Do UV Germicidal Lights Help My Home?
Monday, June 15th, 2015Indoor air quality can be as important as heating or air conditioning when determining the comfort levels of your home. That’s of especial concern here in Portland, OR, where high humidity levels turn our houses into clammy nightmares, breeding germs and bacteria in hidden corners. A good air conditioner can fight some of that, but it’s not meant to specifically address your indoor air quality. A UV germicidal light can, however: improving the freshness in your air and eliminating sickness-causing bacteria to boot. They can be installed in your air conditioning system without a fuss by a trained professional, and can help your home in numerous ways.
Install a Dehumidifier to Maximize Home Comfort
Monday, June 8th, 2015If you live in Portland, OR, you know that rain and high humidity levels are a way of life around here. It gets particularly bad in the summertime, when relative humidity combines with high heat to make things unbearable. Your air conditioner can provide some relief, but cool air can only deal with humidity levels so much. If you really want to address the problem, you should talk to a service professional and have him or her install a dehumidifier to maximize home comfort.
Keep or Replace? How to Decide if You Need a New Air Conditioner
Monday, June 1st, 2015Summer is officially here in Portland, OR, and that means your air conditioning system needs to be ready to keep your home comfortable when the heat and humidity rise to sweltering levels. If your system is exhibiting signs of trouble, now may be the right time to get it replaced with a new model. But how can you tell if that time has come? You certainly don’t want to get rid of your old air conditioner if it’s still doing the job, and a replacement can be costly enough that hoping your system is still functional may trump the reality that it really does need to go. Here’s a few guidelines to help you decide whether to keep or replace your existing air conditioner: