Modern life is practically drenched in chemicals, and many of those chemicals have scary names like butane, formaldehyde, and benzene. Lots of industrial chemicals end up in your house by way of industry, specifically the manufacture of the materials for your house itself. There are also plenty of indoor chemicals that get into your home through daily living activities like cooking food, heating your house, and even storing your clothes.
Knowing what these indoor chemicals are is the first step toward effectively eliminating them from your home. Many of the solutions are fundamentally HVAC solutions that use ventilation and filtration to improve indoor air quality. Here is a look at how these chemicals affect your indoor air quality and health inside your household.
The Chemical Exposure Process Inside Your Home
Let’s look at a specific example: Inside your house, formaldehyde probably originates from manufacturers that employ it to make your home’s building materials or furniture. The chemical is especially common inside products like plywood and particle board, which manufacturers use to repurpose wood, especially scraps, into engineered materials. The chemical helps the product cohere into a durable material, which makes it great for applications like roofing and sheeting, where it effectively is the first layer of your home’s skin.
You also see these engineered wood products in lots of furniture. If you’ve ever seen an end table crack and noticed a kind of gritty wood material that’s almost like foam inside, then you’ve encountered this kind of product.
These chemicals off-gas over time, meaning they slowly escape the materials and end up in the air. That’s where you suffer exposure, and this process is happening every day inside your home.
Dealing With the Health Effects of Indoor Chemicals
Indoor chemicals can trigger a wide range of health effects, but the most common effects often look like allergies. People suffer from runny noses, burning eyes, sore throats, and mucus in their air passages. If you seem to have allergies that never clear up as the seasons change, the chemicals inside your home may be driving the reactions. If unaddressed, these conditions can worsen. They can also irritate existing respiratory conditions, such as asthma or COPD.
On the upside, the right mix of indoor air quality solutions can effectively eliminate exposure. Improved ventilation allows better fresh air exchange, clearing out chemicals like formaldehyde and acetaldehyde. Activated carbon filters are effective against many of the chemicals in household products, like air fresheners, candles, and laundry detergents. MERV 13 or higher filters can clear many chemicals from cooking. And duct and vent cleaning go a long way toward clearing built-up chemicals in your house. When you need indoor air quality services in Lexington, KY, contact Absolute Services.