Radiant Heating Systems Can Warm Up Your Home

Radiant heating systems warm objects and people in a room with gentle, radiating heat. Installed under flooring or inside walls, radiant heaters circulate hot water through a grid of tubing. Unlike forced air furnaces that convey a large volume of hot air into a room, much of which accumulates at the ceiling, heat energy emanated from the radiant tubing rises up from the floor or out from walls, maintaining comfort at the level where occupants are located.

Here are some basics of using radiant technology to warm up your home:

• Radiant heat conducts into all objects in contact with the floor or wall, warming the room evenly and avoiding stratification of heat that commonly occurs with hot air. Radiant heat is more efficient than forced air because air swiftly sheds heat in a room, losing energy fast. This requires longer furnace “on” cycles to reheat air in the room to the thermostat setting. Conducted radiant heat energy in a room is less volatile and maintains temperatures more consistently.

• Everyone’s familiar with the noise associated with rushing air in a forced-air furnace system. Radiant systems silently circulate hot water through tubes in the floor or wall, providing less distracting background noise to the household.

• Airborne allergens are continuously stirred up and conveyed throughout the home by forced-air systems. As these contaminants circulate, occupants may notice an increase in allergy, hay fever and other symptoms. Not the case with radiant heating systems.

• The circulation pumps in radiant heating systems use less electricity than the large blower motors in forced-air heating. In addition, radiant systems can be subdivided into separate zones controlled by dedicated thermostats. This adds the flexibility to reduce heat to unoccupied zones of the home while maintaining warmth in zones where residents are active.

Sobieski Services offers homeowners creative options in heating and cooling equipment, including radiant heating systems.

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).

Image Credit: Zanthia