3 ms·
After reading the LBNL study mentioned in ecovent's whitepaper I do not know what is going on here. The LBNL study concludes: The closing of registers led t
by dfc 13y ago
After reading the LBNL study mentioned in ecovent's whitepaper I do not know what is going on here. The LBNL study concludes:
The closing of registers led to an increase in energy use for the
typical California house and duct system used in this study. The
reduction in building load due to not conditioning the entire house
was more than offset by increased duct system losses mostly due to
increased duct leakage.
The register closing technique has less impact on energy use if
registers furthest from the air handler are closed first because
this tends to only affect the pressures and air leakage for the
closed off branch. Closing registers nearer the air handler tends to
increase the pressures and air leakage for the whole system.
Closing too many registers (more than 60%) is not recommended
because the added flow resistance severely restricts the air flow
though the system to the point where furnaces may operate on the
high-limit switch and cooling systems may suffer from frozen coils.
Register Closing Effects on Forced Air Heating System Performance: http://escholarship.org/uc/item/4vw4v8wz http://escholarship.org/uc/item/4vw4v8wz
- tech_nickl 13y agoHi, I'm one of the co-founders of ecovent. The LBNL study did not address systems that can monitor their impact on an HVAC system. Some homes have leaky ducts and some have very tight ducts. The only way to tell is to measure them. Our system does measure it's impact, and maximizes the comfort and savings available for a given system. We can also provide suggestions for improving your home, such as rooms that need insulation or ducts that are very leaky. The same principle applies to reducing the airflow too much with respect to high limit switches and coil freezing. We monitor and adapt to the situation. Please let us know if you have more questions.