Infrared Heating: How Safe Is It and What Are the Benefits? | If you’re like most homeowners, you may wonder about the most efficient and effective way to heat your home. Whether you’re forging through the coldest nights of winter or thinking ahead during the summer months, your home’s heating system is bound to enter your thoughts. Numerous home heating options are available these days, including heat pumps, furnaces, radiators, radiant floor heating, mini-split systems, fireplaces, and space heaters. Each one has its own set of benefits and disadvantages. Having said that, one alternative that often gets overlooked is infrared heat.
How Does Infrared Heat Work?
Infrared heaters, like those available through BruestCatalyticHeaters.com and other sources, are impressive pieces of equipment. They’re equipped with specialized bars or tubes. When the heaters are turned on, those bars draw energy from their power sources. The energy causes the bars to vibrate rapidly, setting molecules into motion around them.
This motion transforms the energy into invisible waves of infrared radiation. Then, those waves branch out from the heater in search of solid objects. When they hit solid objects, such as people, they’re converted to heat.
This may sound a bit strange and complicated, but we’re all witness to this type of heat every day. It’s similar to the way the sun works, but on a much smaller and far less explosive scale. Our bodies also produce infrared heat from within. It’s a completely natural process that happens to be one of the most effective forms of heating in existence.
Is Infrared Heat Safe?
You may be thinking that if infrared heaters work like the sun and emit radiation, there’s no way they can be safe, especially in enclosed spaces with no ventilation and not very far to go to get away from the warming waves. That’s not the case at all. Infrared heaters are completely safe. They don’t destroy cells from the inside out the way UVC radiation from the sun does.
In truth, you could think of infrared radiation as more of a process than the negative, dangerous, and frightening sense of the term. These heaters simply radiate waves of energy that turn into heat when they reach you.
Imagine it’s a cold winter night. You’re heading to bed, frozen from toes to nose. You leap under the covers and instinctively scoot as close to your partner as possible. Immediately, you feel heat radiating from your partner’s body into your own. At the same time, the covers on the bed are holding in the heat radiating from your body and reflecting it back at you. That’s the same process infrared heaters use to create warmth.
What Are the Benefits of Infrared Heaters?
Infrared heaters offer several benefits when compared to other types of heat sources. One of the most significant is less heat loss. Conventional heat sources essentially try to heat the air in a room more so than the objects. Most of the heat rises to the ceiling where you can’t even feel it. What’s left at floor level eventually permeates the room and begins soaking into the people and objects in it, but it’s a slow process. Infrared heaters heat objects rather than the air, so they work more effectively and lose far less heat along the way. That’s just the beginning.
- Greater Efficiency. Reports show that heating and cooling systems are the primary sources of energy consumption in most homes. At the same time, most of the energy they consume is wasted due to heat loss. It dissipates as it makes its way to various rooms in the home. Since infrared heaters heat objects rather than air, they don’t lose nearly as much energy and heat as other types of heating systems. This extra efficiency adds up to considerable savings.
- Lower Installation Costs. Infrared heaters also cost less to install than other heating systems. They don’t require ductwork or plumbing, so you won’t have to pay for extra materials and labor. You won’t have to worry about having walls or ceilings torn out of your home to accommodate the extra ductwork or pipes followed by extensive repairs after the fact. Since they don’t have an indoor and outdoor unit or a separate boiler and radiators, there’s less equipment to purchase as well.
- Better Indoor Air Quality. Boilers tend to add excess moisture to the air. Fireplaces send smoke and soot into the air. Central heating systems strip the air of moisture, often leaving it too dry. They also accumulate dust, dirt, pollen, chemicals, bacteria, viruses, mold, and other contaminants in their units and ductwork. In turn, all those particles constantly recirculate through your home. They can cause fatigue, headaches, sneezing, coughing, and numerous other health issues. Infrared heaters don’t cause all those problems. They leave you with clean, balanced air and greatly improved indoor air quality.
- Few Maintenance Requirements. Most heating systems require annual inspections and maintenance. They’re also notorious for needing increasingly frequent and expensive repairs as they age. Infrared heaters require little maintenance, if any at all. They don’t break down and leave you in the cold as often as other heat sources, either.
On top of all those benefits, infrared heaters give you more flexibility than other types of heating systems. They allow for individual room temperature control rather than relying on a central thermostat to control the temperature throughout the entire house. Temperatures in each room can be adjusted based on the occupant’s personal preferences. If a room isn’t being used, you can simply turn off the infrared heater in that room instead of wasting energy unnecessarily.
Stay Comfortable with State-of-the-Art Heating
Infrared heat isn’t a new development. It has been around for more than 200 years. Over the years, though, technological advancements have made infrared heaters much more efficient, practical, and aesthetically pleasing than they were in the past.
They can keep your home free of indoor air contaminants and keep your family warmer and more comfortable than other types of heaters. They can also save you money in numerous ways from initial purchase and installation costs to long-term costs of operation. If you’re looking for a safe, effective way to drive away the cold, infrared heaters may be the solution you need.
