Do Dehumidifiers Raise the Air Temperature? Q&A
We receive a lot of questions from customers about the impact dehumidifiers can make on a home. While a dehumidifier’s job is to remove moisture from the air, it can also have other unexpected effects. One question we received from Danny asks why his dehumidifier blows out warm air and what he can do about it. Read the question below and the solution!
Question:
Hi,
I live in an area where both the temperature and humidity are high. I bought a dehumidifier recently, to control the growth of household mold. As instructed by the manual, I kept all the windows and doors of the kitchen closed, and kept the dehumidifier running. It works, and collects about 4-8 liters [1-2 gallons] of water per day.
However, I noticed that the air blown out from the dehumidifier is warm. As a result, the whole kitchen becomes warm and stuffy, which makes me wonder…is this normal? Do all dehumidifiers blow out warm air? Can’t it be just air at room temperature, as I understand that cold air will condense, which is also not good for controlling moisture.
My region is warm enough already, and while this dehumidifier does control moisture level, it brings a whole other set of problems.
Please advise!
Thanks,
Danny
Answer
Dehumidifiers are great way to combat household mold and lower mold growth in your home. To be clear, dehumidifiers are designed to remove moisture from the air, not cool it. Unfortunately, the way they remove this moisture is to reheat the air to further dry it after it releases its moisture.
Basically, the room-temperature humid air enters the dehumidifier, where it’s then cooled to its dew point, which results in its releasing its moisture. This dried air is then heated by the combination of latent heat of condensation, which is a natural result of the process, and by circulating through the condenser where heat is exchanged from it to the air. There’s also some additional heat generated by the dehumidifier’s air compressor. The overall result is that the air going back into the room might be warmer than it was going in, usually around 10 to 15 degrees.
Sizing dehumidifiers correctly is really important as well. If your kitchen is getting too warm because of the dehumidifier, you might be using a dehumidifier too small for the job. A smaller than necessary dehumidifier will keep running to keep up with the larger air volume. A more appropriately sized home dehumidifier will run and then turn off when the humidity has been lowered enough and will not run when the humidity level is lower.
You should be using a dehumidifier that’s able to bring the humidity down to between 40 to 50 percent. With your current dehumidifier you can add an adjustable humidistat to help the dehumidifier regulate the humidity at a set level. A humidistat allows you to run the dehumidifier only when it is needed to bring down the overall humidity of your kitchen and will stop the dehumidifier from raising the temperature of the room This allows the room not to get as warm as if the dehumidifier is constantly running.
Dehumidifier Questions
For more information on dehumidifiers, check out our Learning Center. You’ll find lots of helpful information on topics like air quality and allergies. To discuss any of the dehumidifiers we offer at AllergyBuyersClub.com, get in touch with one of our experts at 1-888-236-7231.