Your feet are the first to know the answer. More and more, folks are finding that the determining factor for heated floors is not the extremes of weather outside, but rather the comfort of your extremities inside. There’s no denying the comfort that comes with heated floors, particularly in the bathroom and kitchen, regardless of how the weather’s doing outside. And extending well beyond this first encounter of feet to floor, the advantages of installing radiant floor heat when you build or remodel are worth discussing.
The Truth About Subtropical
The fact is our environment includes plenty of months when the benefits of a warm floor can be obvious. Even in April, when the average high on Hilton Head Island is 76 degrees, the average low is 54 degrees. In fact, our average low hits the 50s beginning in October, meaning that for more than half the year, our nights will see the 50-degree range or lower. The bottom of this curve – January – has an average low temperature of 39 degrees.
In other words, even on Hilton Head Island, a heated floor can make as much sense for comfort as having a golf jacket. And there’s a physical fact to consider, over and above the outside temperature. People feel more comfortable when their toes and feet are warm and their heads are at a slightly lower temperature. The very nature of human comfort weighs in on the side of a heated floor.
Comfort and More
Living in comfort is a practical enough goal. Most people chose living here in coastal Carolina for that very reason. And yet the practical advantages of heated floors go further still. Radiant heat from the floor is more efficient than forced air for several reasons, and one of them is because it must start and stop less frequently. Maintaining a steady temperature without having to climb back to it calls for less energy overall.
Radiant heating is kinder, too, on the skin. The drying effects of forced air systems are a feature that folks often notice only as they grow older. In many cases, avoiding those effects is one benefit they come to realize only after they have the advantage of experiencing it.
What You’re Used To
One of our favorite bumper stickers – and one that we rarely see anymore – read, “We don’t care how you did it up North.” A harsh bit of humor but one that still comes into play now and then.
Heat pumps and the style of home heating that people first experience on moving to the sea islands and coastal Carolina are not as assertive or persistent as what many were accustomed to when they lived in colder climes. Paradoxically, folks can be surprised by the fact that feeling chilly now and then seems to have come with them from up north. This is not necessarily the body’s sense of temperature, but it often stems from the fact that conventional heating systems down south just don’t work as hard, or as long.
In response, a floor infused with radiant heat can be just the touch that makes your dream home in paradise perfect. Let’s talk it over.
