How to Choose an Energy-Efficient Humidifier

Dry air in your home causes dry skin, scratchy throats, respiratory problems, and even damage to your electronic equipment (from static electricity).

And of course, of greatest relevance to this blog, the more comfortable you feel at a certain temperature, the less you run your home’s HVAC system, and the more energy you save.

So, let’s say you decide you want to humidify your home so you and your family feel more comfortable.

The right humidifier keeps you more comfortable, reduces and eliminates damage to wooden furniture and floors, and helps you avoid unpleasant health conditions.

How Do You Choose the “Right” Humidifier?

The humidifier you choose depends on your personal needs. Comfort may be your main priority. You may need to humidify your whole home…or just a single room.

So you have to sit down and make a list of the problems you want solved and the benefits you want to experience. And then you have to decide what’s most important for you.

3 Types of Humidifiers

Once you go out and start comparing your options, you’ll come across three basic types of humidifiers.

Here’s what they are, and the difference between each:

• Warm-mist humidifiers heat water using an electrical element, and release it into your room as water vapor. They’re popular, but they consume a lot of energy.
• Cool-mist humidifiers blow unheated water through a diffuser. The drawback of these is that if you let the water in them sit around too long, this can lead to the growth of unhealthy bacteria. If you forget to change the water, then you launch those bacteria all over your home.
• Ultrasonic humidifiers use high-frequency sound vibrations to make water vapor from water. They’re by far the most energy-efficient option. However, they keep water at room temperature like cool-mist humidifiers, so you have to make sure to change the water regularly.

Here’s how sizing works:

• If you need to humidify a single room, your humidifier needs a capacity of 1-4 gallons of water
• For 2-3 rooms, increase the capacity to 5-9 gallons
• For a medium-sized house of 1500 – 2000 square feet or so, you need a capacity of 9 or more gallons

In terms of size, you have 3 options:

• Portable humidifiers, which can fit on your tabletop and have a capacity of 1-4 gallons
• Console humidifiers, which are heavy and roll on wheels, but have large capacity
• Whole-home humidifiers, which install into your home’s HVAC system but provide coverage for your entire home if it’s more than one story

Get Ready to Save

Basically, you should keep your home’s humidity at 50% or less. Otherwise, conditions become so humid that mold and bacteria grow.

But, once you have the humidity at the right level, you’ll feel more comfortable, keep your wooden furniture and finish in better shape, and save more energy.

Enjoy!