#Radiant heat system install#

Hydronic, or water systems can be used for a small portion of the air conditioning load but if the pipes are run too cold you will get more condensation than air conditioning. A forced air system allows both introducing fresh air and filtering the air throughout the house at the same time the air is heated.

#Radiant heat system install#

It is true that radiant heat can be the best system for temperature control - but in today's houses it becomes necessary to install a whole house air change or HRV unit to deal with the quality of that perfectly tempered air. In the days of the old cast iron radiators this lack of attention to air quality was not a problem because the houses were so leaky that the wind provided fresh air in all the rooms all the time. In modern air tight houses it is important to take note of the fact that a radiant heating system can give the air in any room the perfect temperature, but does nothing else to help with indoor air quality - there is no air circulation, no filtration and no fresh air change. There are far more variations in radiant heating systems than in forced air systems in that the source of the energy can be anything and heat can be generated locally, as with baseboard electric heaters, or the heat can by transported around the house through water pipes in a myriad of configurations old and new. Radiant heating has two aspects - some heat travels by energy waves through the air and warms up any solid object it hits, just like the sun does and then room air in contact with the radiator or any surface it warms up will pick up some heat and rise upward creating some air circulation in the room. Look up Forced Air in the database for lots more information. The real defining characteristic of a forced air system is that it uses household air to move the heat from the source to the destination. Forced air heating can use any energy source generating heat in what is commonly called a furnace.

Radiant Heating and Convection Heating are the two primary types of ways we heat our houses.Ĭonvection heating means moving hot air - what we usually call a forced air heating system simply heats air and moves it around the house through a system of fans and ducts.