You may have heard about radiant heating, an alternative to the traditional home heating method of using a furnace or heat pump that sends heated air through ductwork. Radiant heating isn’t new technology. At the core, it just describes a type of movement of heat. When you feel the warmth of the sun on your skin, or you put your hand near a hot surface, you’re feeling radiant heat energy.
Radiant heat is the movement of thermal energy from one object to another without heating the air between them. This is different from convection heating, the movement of thermal energy through the movement of heated air, which is the type of heating you get from a forced-air system like a furnace.
The most common type of radiant heating system in homes is a hydronic boiler. The boiler heats water and sends it to terminal points in the living space: baseboard heaters, radiators, in-floor tubing. These objects heat up from the water and radiate heat into the rooms.
Installing radiant heating in Bensalem, PA is often a big project, and it’s best done during construction or remodeling. But there are several benefits of a radiant heating system compared to a forced-air one, and these may make you consider going with radiant for your next HVAC system.
High energy efficiency
Water is a better medium for the transfer of heat than air—much less energy is lost in the process of heating a space hydronically than blowing around heated air. When you use a radiant heating system as the primary method of keeping your home comfortable in winter, you can expect to pay less on your annual heating costs.
They’re fast
One trouble that forced-air heaters encounter is that hot air rises quickly to the ceiling, making it take longer to get the whole room warm. Radiant systems don’t have this problem, as they send their heat energy directly to all the objects in the room, including people, getting a space warmer much faster.
More even heating
Forced-air heating doesn’t work well at getting rid of all the cold spots in a room. The ceiling will be warmer than the floor, and the air currents don’t always spread their warmth evenly. Radiant heating creates an even spread of warmth, especially from in-floor radiant heating.
Less dusty air
Because standard forced-air heating systems use ductwork to transport heated air, they can blow around a lot of dust and other debris from inside the ducts into a house. Ducts are notorious for collecting dust over time. Radiant heating is clean heating, and this makes it especially appealing to households with people who suffer from allergies and asthma.
It feels better
This is subjective, but most people find the heat coming from radiators, baseboard heaters, and floor elements to be cozier than that from heated air currents. Radiant heat has the sensation of being outside on a warm, calm day, feeling the beams of the sun. And there’s little that feels better on a cold morning than to wake up and put your feet down on a heated floor.
To find out more about radiant heating options, talk to our professionals.
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