A 3 Step Approach to Household Mold Removal

Mold can be a significant problem for Oklahoma City area homeowners, especially during the cooling season. Excess mold can damage your home and lead to allergic reactions and asthma attacks. It's especially important to keep mold away from your HVAC system, because if it gets infected mold can spread throughout your entire home.

Luckily, there are many things homeowners can do to prevent mold from growing and spreading in their homes.

What household mold needs to grow

Mold is something that's always present in our homes, but it only becomes a problem when it finds the right conditions to grow in. In order for mold to grow, it needs moisture, darkness and food. Mold often becomes a problem during the warmer months of the year because the humidity is higher, which creates the moisture it needs to grow.

3 steps to household mold removal

In order to stop mold from growing in your house, you need to deprive it of the moisture, darkness and food that it needs to survive.

1. Install a whole house dehumidifier. Moisture is a breeding ground for mold, so by preventing high humidity levels in your home you can also prevent mold from growing. A whole house dehumidifier can maintain an ideal indoor humidity level of under 55 percent, which will help avoid mold and improve comfort levels in your home.
2. Install a UV light. Since mold needs darkness to grow, you can avoid it by introducing light to the dark parts of your HVAC system. A UV light can be installed in your ductwork or near your air conditioner coils in order to prevent mold from spreading throughout your house.
3. Use a high quality air cleaner. Mold feeds off of all kinds of organic matter, including airborne particles from wood, paper, paint and drywall. By using a high quality air cleaner, you can remove a significant amount of the particles in your air and starve the mold by restricting access to its food.

Remember that if you are already experiencing mold growth, you need to get rid of the existing mold before using the preventive measures listed above. This could include the need for duct cleaning if mold has been identified in your ducts or around your air registers.

If you have any questions about household mold removal, or if you'd like help improving the air quality in your home, contact Comfort Incorporated, your Oklahoma City HVAC company.