If you're looking for a way to lower your energy bill this summer, closing your vents may be an easy way to do so. When you close your vents, you can limit the flow of air through your home and avoid temperature-controlling rooms you don't visit frequently.
One of the easiest ways to trim a little off your energy bill is to close your basement vents. If you don't frequently use your basement or the rooms in the lower levels of your home, it's the most cost-effective to seal them off during the summer.
Does closing vents in unused rooms help? The answer is no: In reality, it may hurt your HVAC system, lead to costly repairs, and cause other problems.
After all, your HVAC system will have to work harder to maintain temperatures. One way to help save money is by closing vents in your basement. While this might seem counterintuitive, humid and hot air can drift into your basement if the vents are left open during the summer.
Those crawl spaces generally have the worst insect and rot damage. If you must close your vents during winter I highly encourage you to do it only when the temperature drops below 32⁰. Otherwise, keep them open when the temperature is consistently above freezing to avoid moisture-related problems.
In general, it is usually OK to close vents in a basement. It is on the main floor that you probably do not want to close any vents. Your furnace fan is moving cool air in the summer months. If you reduce the number of exit points for the cool air, your furnace fan can no longer move as much air.
When To Close the Vents. If summer is the right time to open your crawl space vents, winter is the perfect time to close them. Colder weather results in drier air. Dry air and freezing temperatures are the biggest risks for crawl spaces due to the likelihood of freezing pipes.
Because heat rises, homeowners can consider partially closing upstairs vents and fully opening those downstairs. The top floor often steals most of the heat, but partially closing vents can help to keep other areas of your house warmer without damaging or stressing your house's HVAC system.
Improper insulation might make one room colder or hotter than the rest because it's letting the air out of the room. If you have any windows in your home that are open, go ahead and shut them. They're letting the cooled/heated air out and letting in the outside air.
If you close vents in unused rooms, you are restricting the duct system. Closing one or two vents will probably not be an issue, but if you close several vents, the pressure in your duct system will be too high.
If you have a basement, you can push more cool airflow up to the second floor by locating the dampers on your ducts and closing them at least halfway. If you can't find the dampers or don't have a basement, you can partially close the vents on your first floor register to achieve the same effect.
The solutions most commonly recommended for warming up a basement are to insulate the below-grade walls and the floors, and to add heating—either through installing radiant heat floors or making revisions to the main HVAC ductwork system.
With heating and cooling accounting 50 percent of your energy bill every month, it is important to leave the vents open in every room in the house to cut down on energy costs.
An HVAC system is not equipped with a sensor that determines when you have closed or open registers throughout your house. Therefore, it will still use the same amount of energy to produce the same amount of warm or cold air.
One question we are receiving a lot as a result of this update is whether trickle vents can cause heat loss in the home. The short answer is no*, but allow us to explain why you don't need to be concerned about heat loss through trickle vents.
Damage to Your Ductwork
When multiple vents are closed, that airflow must be redirected to other areas of your home where vents are open and the air can be released. This causes pressure to build up within your ductwork, which can lead to serious and expensive damage down the road.
Warm air may blow from your vents if there is a big enough leak in your home's ductwork. The ducts within your home deliver cool air throughout the home, but if there is a leak, warm air can be mixed into the already cooled air producing warmer than normal air blowing from your vents.
Uneven heat in your home is typically caused by one or more of three factors: poor airflow in your heating system, inadequate insulation, or air in your home. More specifically, causes include: Restricted airflow between the furnace and vents. Leaky or poorly installed ductwork.
When temperatures drop below the freezing point, water pipes in the crawl space are bound to freeze if the vents remain open. It's a good practice to close off the vents in winter. Doing so prevents the dry, cold winter air from freezing the pipes inside the crawl space.
Conversely, in the Winter heating season, you will want to pull the coldest air back to the furnace to be warmed and create circulation. In these months, you'll want the lower air return open and the upper air return closed.
These vents allow outside air to circulate under the floor in summer to prevent the moisture buildup that encourages mildew and rot. In winter, when the air is drier, the vents are closed to reduce the chance that the pipes in the crawl space might freeze.
Attic vents must remain open year-round to avoid spending thousands of dollars on home repairs and electricity bills. Keeping your attic vents open even in winter may sound counterintuitive if you want to save on heating bills or if you want to keep your home safe during winter. But attic vents exist for a reason.
If you prioritize heating, put the HVAC and vents in (or below) the floor. This principle works for return vents as well. Place returns for cooling in the ceiling where the warm air congregates and heating returns in or near the floor where the cold air congregates.