Ridge and soffit vents are also helpful for venting hot air and keeping an attic cool but you ll need a little extra help as this method alone probably won t remove enough heat to keep the space comfortable enough to live in.
Ways to remove heat from attic.
In the winter warm moist air seeps into the attic from the living space below.
Many homeowners falsely assume that since their attics are extremely hot in the summer the best way to reduce their cooling load is to get the heat out of the attic.
In the summer good attic ventilation reduces heat buildup.
Alternatively install passive vents such as gable soffit and ridge vents which are openings in the roof that allow hot air to escape.
Powered attic ventilators are the worst way to try to keep your attic cool.
The air pushes up into the attic through the soffit vents and out through the ridge vents providing a continuous flow.
These keep the attic cooler than dark shingles.
When reroofing use white or pale gray shingles instead of dark ones.
This is a coating material that gets sprayed onto the outside of your roof to help reduce the amount of heat that is radiated into your attic.
Ridge vents are a small opening in the ridge of the roof and a soffit vent is a small vent installed under the roof eaves.
Start by examining the insulation that is already in your attic.
Ridge vents are the exhaust vents that are located along the ridgeline of your roof.
Passive attic ventilation passive attic vents are the vents installed in attic during the construction to let moisture escape from an attic in the event moisture gets into the attic.
They ve been well discussed here and other places but briefly they re not cost effective don t deal with the problem where it starts are using convection to solve a radiant heat problem and can even be dangerous by backdrafting combustion appliances and.
They have thermostats that turn the fan on at a recommended preset temperature of 100 110 degrees.
Gable vents around 25 each plus 75 per vent for labor can lower attic temperatures about 10 degrees.
The system operates on the simple principle that hot air rises.
A ridge and soffit ventilation system an extra 200 during reroofing will reduce attic temperature to around 100 degrees.
Keep that super heated air from seeping into your living space.
Install electric ventilators and attic fans which remove hot air from an attic.
That cuts cooling costs and prolongs shingle life.
Good ventilation allows the heat and moisture to escape.
This will keep your attic cooler which will reduce the cooling load on your home.
Two items of concern regarding attic ventilation are moisture controlling in the winter and heat removal in the summer.
Your attic can get as hot as 150 degrees in the summer.
The radiant barrier is shown to reduce about 68 of the heat that is being radiated into the attic.