a cultural question...

[ratcreature]

I've noticed several times references in fiction about people airing out their house once it got warmer that made it sound as if Americans don't open their windows in winter to let fresh air in. Like as if they don't air their house if it's freezing outside.

Is that true? Is it a central air conditioning thing where you don't really need windows to get fresh air, and shouldn't disrupt climate control or something like that? Because otherwise I can't imagine not to open my windows at least twice a day for a little while. Admittedly it's rarely extremely cold here, but this winter we had days when the daytime high was below -10°C and I still aired out my place briefly.

Here you are even required to do so in rental agreements because otherwise you get problems with moisture buildup and such.

Comments

[madripoor_rose]

Yeah, you don't open up in the winter because you've got the furnace running and it would be letting the heat out. And winter air is so dry (maybe because of the heating?) that moisture buildup isn't a problem, in fact we run a humidifier to add moisture to the indoor air in winter, and stop that in late spring.

Of course, we do get low temperatures around -28 °C.

[ratcreature]

That is so weird to me. Doesn't the air get gross and stuffy? I don't know anyone here who would tolerate that. Except maybe people in zero-energy houses that have some sort of air flow system, but I don't know anyone living in something like that.

I mean, I don't leave the windows open for long in winter, but in my experience a brief airing does make the room really cold, even if it is quite cold outside. Like I've opened my bedroom window for ten minutes or so in the evening, even on the coldest nights this winter, and those approached -20°C.

[madripoor_rose]

The air does get stuffy, but I guess we're just used to it? And that's why the Spring Airing Out is such a thing, something to look forward to.

Thinking about it, our house does get aired out a bit when it isn't absolutely freezing, just because when we do the shopping we leave the door propped open while bringing bags into the house, but don't consider it an official 'airing out'.

[ratcreature]

Here everyone tells you to air every room at least twice a day for 15 minutes. But seasonal airing out isn't a thing afaik. I do less than that in winter, like I only air my kitchen in the evenings after cooking, and because my bedroom and study are connected I often only open one window, but still. I already find it stuffy if I come home from outside after just a day of standing air.

[sholio]

Rarely. My dorm actually had a rule where we weren't allowed to open our windows when it was below freezing because it supposedly raised heating costs (which really sucked for people on the top floors, because those floors were stuffy and hot while the ground floor was barely comfortable).

I occasionally open mine in winter but usually just for things like letting out smoke if I accidentally let something burn in the kitchen, or cooling down the room if it gets too hot, and not very often otherwise; I guess, like madripoor-rose said, I think of it as something that would be inefficient because of letting heat out. It's so interesting to me that it's such a common thing there!

[ratcreature]

Energy efficiency is very much a priority here, like there are rules about insulation, government support to insulate older houses and upgrade heating systems and so on, and of course fossil fuels are taxed increasingly to comply with the climate goals and such. They teach you in school how to air out your place efficiently, like don't leave the window open a little for a long time but open wide briefly etc. I honestly don't know anyone who doesn't let air in in winter. Not doing that is thought to be very unhealthy for the indoor climate and air quality. Like you are basically told that you'd get sick without enough fresh air indoors. I'm still kind of astonished that Americans might keep their windows closed for months. I never imagined that.

[sheron]

Wow, so don't ask me how I tripped over this post, but hi! Random sholio encounter!

(i think it was via some post-IW browser trip, ratcreature, sorry to barge in)

But... this is SO deeply weird to me. I mean, I know it's true, because I'm constantly having to figure out if hotels I'm staying at will let me open windows or not, because sometimes they don't and I cannot breathe. But just... I always have my window open, 365 days a year. It's an apartment though. I guess if it gets to -20C (-4F) or lower I might consider shutting the bedroom window at night and getting my air through the open door/living room window, but those days are rare.

So. Just a random culture clash moment. I can't deal with air-less rooms. Now you know!

[gwyn]

No, never. I have a forced-air furnace that would kick on if I let cold air in, and I don't want it to run anymore than I have to have it, because like madripoor rose, I have to add moisture to the air (that's the big issue with forced air). Maybe it's different for people with radiant heat of some sort, but I really don't know people who do that. We'd think it's as weird in reverse as you think it's weird we don't. :-D

Though I do know people who open windows when they sleep, since they like it cold. I don't even leave windows open when I sleep in summer, despite stifling heat, because I live alone on a single floor house and anyone could just break in. I'm not comfortable with that.

[ratcreature]

Forced air is really uncommon here. I have never seen it in a private home. You have radiators, or more luxuriously floor heating. And you definitely will get trouble with the damp and mold if you don't air your home properly, especially in older buildings like mine, that's from around 1900.

They were built back when the windows were the coldest because they were single pane or simple double pane and water would condense there and do no damage. Now windows are all insulated so often the coldest spots will be on the walls in the corners and you will get mold problems, because moisture from living will condense there if you don't air carefully. And that is why rental agreements often demand airing.

But I also rarely leave my windows open over night because without the sound insulation traffic is fairly loud. Though sometimes I have trouble with temperature in the summer because I'm directly under the roof and of course no one has A/C here, and unfortunately my windows all open only to one side, so no cross breeze. During one particularly bad heath wave few years back (iirc 2006? that year when many died of excessive heat in Europe) I left my front door open at night in addition to the windows as a last resort to get some air flow.

[peoriapeoriawhereart]

Forced air is very common here, and is the rule for more modest old homes while the quality older homes have/had boilers and thus radiators. Newer homes may have one or another electric systems.

As a Midwesterner, airing out the house happens for the final time prior to heating season and then only again after heating season has ended. There is some exchange, because of older houses not being air-tight. (That would have been lethal back in the coal burning days.) Mind you, there is some weirdness regarding some people opening the windows regardless of time of year.

In case you didn't know, many American homes have bathroom fans (you do lose some heat unless there is an exchanger, but don't get too much cold air in) and or range hoods in the kitchen.

[domarzione]

I have a Dalek-sized humidifier for my apartment because it gets so dry in the winters, but I keep the windows closed save for a crack in certain rooms because I don't control my heat -- the building does. And my building does not blast the heat like most NYC buildings do, so if I open the windows, it's gonna get really cold and I have no way to deal with that save by putting on more clothes.

So, yes, getting to open the windows is a definite sign that Spring Is Here.

[ratcreature]

Here the usual setup is that every room has a radiator with an individual thermostat you can adjust and these also each have an instrument measuring the heat, that then via some formula can determine how much energy you use, so utility pay is supposed to divided by consumption to encourage energy saving.

In reality that method mostly leads to enormous bureaucratic costs because the installation and reading of the meters and the calculation needs to be outsourced by landlords to specialized firms who charge quite a bit (also there are only like three of these with iirc two being the same company just under different brands after mergers, and they all seem to charge about the same horrendous prices and I remember reading some newspaper article about some corrupt price fixing cartel), and those fees in turn get added on to your utility bill. But I guess the actual energy use is down so it's a climate plus, even if it costs you more for less warmth.

Anyway. The buildings themselves also usually regulate the heat in the form of a heating curve of the central heat in that at night the overall heat is regulated downward and up during the day, so your individual thermostats work from a relative baseline.

But in all guides to energy efficient heating I have received here (and I've gotten quite a few over the decades, from landlords, from the company installing the energy monitoring, in the usual seasonal newspaper articles etc.), the emphasis was that leaving windows open a little constantly would loose a lot of heat but airing briefly for room climate and fresh air was encouraged. And that to save energy mostly you should regulate the average temperature down but not turn down the heat when you leave and then on again, because warming up a cold room again needs more energy than keeping it warm while you're gone. They also tend to recommend it much colder than I like especially in bedrooms, because apparently most people here like their bedroom cold (16°C) whereas I like to sleep warm at 18-20° no matter that everyone says that you sleep better in cooler rooms.

[katarik]

Like everyone else American who's commented, I keep the windows closed if I've turned the heat on. I live in a very moist area of the country, but there's definitely nothing in the rental agreements about airing out an apartment during winter. I do find it gets stuffy, so any day it's warm enough that I don't *have* to have the heat on, I open the window for a bit, but ultimately I would rather be stuffy than cold, and really cold days are almost always dry anyway.

(I also grew up in a part of the country that only dropped below freezing at night, and that only for maaaaaybe a month. I don't handle cold well.)

[ratcreature]

Obviously there are huge difference in the ideas about room climate and heating strategies! Who knew. They never cover that in the local culture section in language classes.


Though actually in my Russian class our teacher this winter contrasted German and Russian heating customs, after the German students immediately opened the classroom windows to air the room before the lesson even while we had a cold snap outside, and he found it too cold very soon. Apparently Russians prefer it much warmer indoors than Germans in general, so he also complained that at his home even with turning up the heat all the way he could not get his place as warm as a Russian apartment would be, and whenever he had Russian visitors over they in turn would complain about the cold... He explained that since Russian have to deal with much more extreme levels of cold outside they like it cosy inside.

I have to admit though that in general people here seem to like their bedrooms much colder than my own preferences too (it's usually recommended to keep bedrooms at just 16°C but I like to sleep warmer). So I can see the point.

[mirabile]

Here's the reverse: I'm now living in the Southwest where it gets really, really, REALLY hot, and we don't open the doors or windows in the summer, at all, so we go months without opening the house. Then, in the (very short) autumn, we fling open the doors and windows and let the house air out. It's a wonderful moment. The winters do get cold here, but nothing like the rest of the country, so we can keep the house open during the day.

As an illustration, my husband checked the temperature and realized that (at 10 at night) it's still warmer out than in, so the house is still shut up. If he wakes up in the night and the outside temperature has dropped a bit, he'll open the doors and windows, but in another couple of weeks, the temp won't drop enough and we'll be locked up all summer.

[lilacsigil]

I'm in a part of Australia where it will be very hot for several days (up to two weeks) in a row then have a sudden cool change. It's such a relief to open the house up after those hot days and nights! Where my grandparents lived, though, they were locked up all summer like you, and I don't think I could deal with that.

[ratcreature]

Yes, it sounds so horrible. I understand it more with heat because I have no experience with A/C but it seems to me that it is harder to cool a house significantly than to heat it. But I really don't get why people would voluntarily do it in winter (except maybe with extreme temperatures or idk if you live somewhere extremely polluted), when really it does not get that cold inside after opening the window briefly and will heat up soon enough and fresh air is so nice.

[mirabile]

It is hard to be locked up for months like that, I agree. We might get another cool spell but mid-May, it's hot all the time here in the southwestern part of the US. I envy you the sudden cool change!

[ratcreature]

With air conditioning that makes more sense to me. It's rare here, but buildings with climate control like offices often also don't let you open the windows. Ditto for the modern buses or trains, which then really sucks when the A/C breaks down.

[lovelokest]

Don't open the windows in the dead of winter (very dry and well below freezing), but the moment spring weather hits the windows open.

[ratcreature]

I admit that I don't quite get why dryness is a problem but then here it is always wet. In summer more than in winter but rains throughout the year. It's about as wet as Seattle, but more evenly distributed with more rainy days. It rains on 190 per year on average and all months have quite a lot of rain, and it is always wet (the whole area was a miserable swampland mixed with river delta wetlands before we humans ruined the ecosystem for everyone else and installed a ton of drainage ditches to make it nice).

[peoriapeoriawhereart]

Warm air holds moisture, cold air sheds it. As cold as it gets in winter, then using natural gas to heat, hanging my laundry in the basement is a viable means of adding humidity. And it does get the clothes dry. So, that's how dry it is in a Midwestern home during winter. Loads of laundry air dry in the basement.

I find it very weird to see windows getting opened during the heat of the day (because I'm used to a system of summer night venting and then conserving that cool the whole of the next day.)

[mific]

Heh. I live in humid semi-tropical Auckland, in a decaying old wooden house in the bush. Almost none of the windows open any more but I often leave doors open for airing, and anyway there are draft cracks all over the place and the cat door is a hole cut in the front door, so it’s pretty aired out!
My main cultural dislocation with city or harsh climate dwellers is cats who live all their lives inside and can’t come and go freely. Possum wouldn’t like missing his bush adventures at all.

[ratcreature]

I noticed that too that many people from the US have a problem with letting cats roam, because it might shorten their lives, but it is very acceptable here to let your cats roam if you can arrange access to a backyard or garden even in the city. The general thought is that it has dangers but improves their quality of life so much that it is worth it. My brother's last cats were indoor outdoor and they lived to nearly fifteen, despite the cars and the fact that some asshole in his neighborhood actually shot at them with some sort of air rifle, which my brother only noticed long after when stray pellets showed up in medical scans for unrelated illnesses.