\"out of the box\" dehumidification

Unknown

Hey all,

I have a client, we're looking at putting an HRV system in their house, very humid summer climate, very tight house construction.

Of course, wintertime humidity will be mitigated by the HRV bringing in dry outside air and blowing the moist air out. However, it's the summertime I'm concerned with, especially with possible condensation in the finished basement areas. It's a wood framed basement (new one on me!) so I am thinking it would be very prudent to include dehumidification to help prevent premature rot down there.

Feel free to correct me at any time, this is an odd situation!

Anyway, I was looking around for a ducted dehumidifier to include in-line with the HRV's supply duct. However the only one I can find is the "Santa Fe" which is way out of the price range. So I thought about it some more, and considered the possibility of putting a regular old floor-sitting dehumidifier in a slightly oversized framed box in the mechanical room, and running the supply duct into the box and out again before supplying the rest of the house with at least partially dehumidified air. I figure this will have some cooling benefit as well and it should be pretty cheap.

Never seen it before though... am I way out in left field on this?

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Ranger

Model 1700

Check out the Model 1700 de-humidifier from aprilaire (in conjunction with the HRV) aprilaire.com

Unknown

that looks like a nice match, thanks!

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RKB

Case Study

Take a look at this case study, it has some good info.
http://www.buildingscience.com/resources/mechanical/conditioning_air.pdf

RKB

Tom Blackwell

Humidity Control

I agree, the Aprilaire dehumidifier should help the situation. As with any high humidity application, the problem is dehumidifying with no cooling load. Remember that water vapor migrates irrespective of airflow driven by the difference in vapor pressure across whatever the house envelope is. This means that the indoor environment will try to equal the gross humidity ratio of the outdoors at a lower dry bulb temperature (assuming it's warmer outside). By forcing a quantity of outdoor air into the envelope that is dryer than ambient, then the indoor wet bulb temperature can be depressed. Another option is to install a small cooling unit in parallel with the main unit, on the order of less than a ton, and operate it continuously based on humidity level. This works if there is SOME cooling load. Hope this helps...

JimGPE_14

No sensible cooling...

Dehumidifiers do not cool in the sense that they lower the room temperature. They actually raise the temperature of the room as they remove moisture.

[If you care, they remove some of the moisture from the air, then add back into the air the compressor work and the latent heat as sensible heat, resulting in much warmer air leaving than entering.]

It might still work, but it is not going to provide "some cooling."