Fresh air for the sealed houses west of I-95, in three questions
A new house in Hunter's Ridge or Plantation Bay costs nothing extra to leave stuffy. It costs a little to fix, and the fix answers three questions people ask in the same order.
The cost, in plain terms
The newest neighborhoods in Ormond Beach, Hunter’s Ridge, Plantation Bay and the recent sections of Halifax Plantation, were built to codes that seal a house far tighter than the 1980s stock down Nova Road. Tight is good for the FPL bill. It is bad for the air, because the carbon dioxide, cooking fumes, cleaning products and the moisture from showers and breathing have nowhere to go. Nothing on the bill tells you this is happening. What tells you is the morning headache, the stuffy bedrooms, and a house that smells like last night’s dinner at breakfast.
The fix, an energy recovery ventilator, runs a small fan around the clock. On an FPL bill it is the cost of a couple of light bulbs a month. The air conditioner does slightly more work handling the fresh air the ERV brings in, but far less than it would if the same air came through an open window, because the ERV hands most of the heat and moisture back to the outgoing air on the way through. Over a nine-month cooling season, the net is small and the difference in the house is not.
Is it loud?
No. The ERV is a quiet box, usually mounted in the garage or a utility closet, with insulated ducts to an outdoor hood and into the return. Indoors you hear nothing. Outdoors it is quieter than a bathroom fan. The retirees who make up a third of the city and spend their afternoons on a lanai a few feet from the equipment will not notice it running, and we size the ducting so the fresh-air supply does not whistle at the grille.
Will it make the house humid?
This is the question that matters in Ormond Beach, where the summer dew point sits in the 70s. A plain fresh-air duct, the cheap option, would. An energy recovery ventilator will not, in any season that matters, because its core passes moisture from the humid incoming air to the drier outgoing air. The house still gains a little moisture in July, which the air conditioner handles, and the ERV is paired with a dehumidifier in houses that need one. We choose ERVs here rather than the heat recovery units sold in cold climates for exactly this reason.
Ask whether your house needs one
Is the air cleaner?
Yes, in two ways. Fresh outdoor air dilutes what builds up inside, which is the main point. And the ERV’s own filter catches pollen and dust before the air enters the house, which matters when the oaks are dropping in March and when the lots next door are still being cleared and built. For a household managing allergies in a tight new house, the ERV plus a media filter on the air handler is the combination that works; a purifier alone just recirculates the same stale air more cleanly.
Putting one in
One day. The unit mounts in the garage, the outdoor hood goes on a wall away from the dryer vent and the condenser’s exhaust, the fresh-air duct ties into the return, and a control goes beside the thermostat. On a Lennox system it can be integrated with the thermostat; on another brand it runs on its own controller. We check the condensate drain for the ERV core while we are there, and we check whether the builder’s bath fans are actually venting outdoors, which in a few new houses they are not. The estimate is free, the crew is 38 minutes away at our Palm Coast headquarters, and the number is 866-266-5709.
Ventilation questions from the newer neighborhoods
Does my 1980s house in Woodmere need an ERV too?
Almost never. Houses of that era leak enough air through the envelope and the attic ducts to ventilate themselves, badly but adequately. The money there is better spent sealing the ducts and controlling humidity.
Why not just crack a window?
Because an Ormond Beach window lets in a 72-degree dew point along with the fresh air, and the system then spends money removing it. An ERV brings in the air while handing most of the moisture and heat back to the outgoing stream.
Can the ERV run on its own schedule?
Yes, and it should. We set it for continuous low ventilation or a timed cycle, with a boost for cooking or guests, so it is not dependent on the air conditioner calling.
What is the difference between an ERV and the bath fan I already have?
The bath fan only exhausts; it pulls air out and lets the house suck replacement air through whatever gap it finds, often the garage. The ERV brings in a measured amount of outdoor air, filters it, tempers it and delivers it where you want it.
New house, stale air?
An ERV sized to the house, installed in a day, running for pennies.