Saving Home Energy (Magazines)

Here’s how to protect valuable possessions—like your collection of Home Energy magazines—in your basement.

by Andrew Rudin

Mold, mildew, and rot are causing a lot of problems these days. The company that carries the commercial liability insurance for my energy surveying work just sent me an exclusion of coverage on any work I do dealing with mold and mildew. That caught my attention. Why all the concern? There are several reasons. Newer houses are tighter, trapping more humidity. Builders have substituted oriented strand board (OSB) for plywood. In OSB, the cellular structures of the wood have been ripped open, leaving them vulnerable to mold. Plywood has layers of resin between layers of wood with relatively intact cells; these intact cells act as mold barriers. And more people have developed allergies to molds and mildews. Thus control of mold and mildew—and therefore of humidity—is of greater concern than ever.

One way to control home humidity is by using a residential dehumidifier. A dehumidifier is like an air conditioning system that first cools the air to condense water with an evaporator coil. Then, unlike the air conditioner, the dehumidifier returns the heat back to the air through a separate heating condenser coil. The net effect is that the dehumidifier adds heat—all the heat removed from the air is returned and the compressor heat is added back in. This is in contrast to air conditioning, which dehumidifies but also cools, since the heat rejection coil—the condenser—is outside.

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