The only time i would ever use an attic fan is if i had a roof that was unusually difficult to vent passively.
Do solar attic fans save money.
If you can improve ventilation in your attic and reduce the amount of heat the space holds and pushes into your home you ll reduce the cooling load on your air conditioner and save money on your utility bills.
You re almost always better off using passive ventilation like a ridge vent a soffit vent that sort of thing to reduce attic temperatures and not use an attic fan.
This is basically how air naturally moves.
Danny s tests of solar attic fans showed that in florida where there s abundant solar energy yearly savings from installing two fans in a house with just over 1 000 square feet of air conditioned floor area amounted to only 460 kwh.
That means it could take between 10 15 years to get back to even with this investment.
Meanwhile solar attic fans are free to run lower your electric bills and have few costs beyond purchase and installation.
Here are some more benefits of getting a solar attic fan.
Let s assume that you have a supertight house and no.
Solar attic fans work by pulling in the cold air from the soffits and pushing out the hot air that has accumulated at the top of the attic.
Attic fan ventilation attic fans are intended to cool hot attics by drawing in cooler outside air from attic vents soffit and gable and pushing hot air to the outside.
For example if you had a hip roof.
When exploring the best attic ventilation practices consider installing an attic ventilation fan to keep the hot air from settling in.
The attic fan just helps the air move more which adds cooler air circulation.
As hgtv points out cooling a 1 000 square foot home with solar attic fans can save you about 40 per year in a warm climate like florida.
Attic fan savings claims.
Depending on what your utility charges that s about 40 per year.
The solar attic fans all moved less than 1 000 cubic feet of air per minute cfm and they did nothing to lower the temperature inside my own attic.
However if your attic has blocked soffit vents and is not well sealed from the rest of the house attic fans will suck cool conditioned air up out of the house and into the attic.
Cold air is at the bottom and warm air is at the top.
Hip roofs are tough.
Solar attic fan reviews even though electric attic fans can lower your air conditioning costs they cost more money to run than what they save you.
Larger homes that need larger a c units can save even more.
Attic fans cool the attic which helps cool the rooms just under it.
Using a whole house fan can result in a savings of over 300 each month of running a 3500w a c unit during the hottest part of summer.