Need a New Air Conditioner? Tips to Finding the Right One for Your Home

When most homeowners need a new air conditioner, they tend to go for the biggest A/C they can buy. After all, bigger is better when it comes to cooling a home, right?

Turns out that’s far from true. An oversized air conditioner can actually be bad for home comfort and energy efficiency. An A/C that’s too large will cool your room, but it won’t have enough time to remove excess humidity from the air. The end result is a room that feels damp, clammy and ultimately uncomfortable. If you want to stay cool and comfortable while the heat is on, choosing a properly-sized A/C is absolutely important. The following tips can help you make the right choices whenever you need a new air conditioner:

• Use the square footage of the room that’s being cooled to determine the capacity (in British Thermal Units per hour) needed to cool it. For example, a room that’s 500 square feet in size may need at least 12,000 BTU in cooling capacity.
• Be mindful of where you install the unit. If it’s to be located in a corner, for instance, make sure it can still deliver airflow where needed.
• If you plan on using your unit in a kitchen, add an extra 4,000 BTUs to its cooling capacity to compensate for the extra heat often generated by cooking.
• Add an extra 600 BTUs for every additional person if more than two people are to occupy a room.
• Heavily shaded rooms can use a 10 percent reduction in capacity, while rooms that are exposed to lots of sunlight need an additional 10 percent to stay cool. The next time you need a new air conditioner for your home, contact Sobieski Services.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in Delaware, Pennsylvania, Maryland and New Jersey about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC & plumbing systems).

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