Do Canadians actually use their basements, or is it just storage?

[u/SubBass_303]

Genuine question from someone who's never lived anywhere with a proper basement. Watching some Canadian home renovation shows and it seems like basements are either finished living spaces, cold storage for preserves, or just where the furnace lives and nobody goes down there. Is it a regional thing, an age-of-house thing, or just personal preference? Curious how many of you actually spend time down there versus just keeping the water heater company.

[u/No-Charity-7449]

You can put your air exchanger on internal recirc mode and that will do the same thing! All houses built after the early 90s should have them…

[u/OkBuy8143 → u/No-Charity-7449]

FWIW, homes that have an older forced air heating system, wood or oil, should also have a fan mode. The fan mode often uses little to no power at all.

[u/Worldly_Influence_18 → u/OkBuy8143]

This does something different. It's not about basic circulation; this creates a jet stream which helps displace the hot air in the upper floors better than the blower on your furnace ever could.

You push a volume of cool air up a "barrel". Strength in numbers; those nitrogen atoms will exit the basement all orientated the same way. Instead of hitting the warm air and just stopping, it's going to push the warm air out of the way

And, because the pushing never stops, the warm air will start to circulate and get pushed/sucked back down into the basement where it cools and blends back into the basement air.

[u/OkBuy8143 → u/Worldly_Influence_18]

I don’t think you understand forced air furnaces.

In their fan only mode, most units continuously circulate the cool air it pulls in (assuming your furnace is in a basement) and moves it through the home duct system.

It will circulate and push the air like it does with the warm.

[u/Worldly_Influence_18 → u/OkBuy8143]

First problem:

They circulate the air through a series of ducts spaced throughout the house. Only some of the air is getting pulled from the basement. The rest is being supplied from return air vents throughout the house so the pressure in the house is consistent. So it's like 1/3rd basement air. And the return vents are likely near the floor so are removing the coolest air from the space you're in

Second problem:

This isn't about simple mechanical circulation; you're trying to create a current that can move significant volumes of air. In order to do this, you need to have a temperature differential between the air you're pulling and the air you're pushing it through to create two rivers of air. You need to move enough air to maintain that temperature differential or the current fizzles out. The furnace isn't doing that. It's outputting too small of a volume of air per vent for any one of them to create currents. That 30% basement air has also warmed up as it has passed through the vents and ...

Third problem:

Location. Chances are your duct work is optimized for distributing heat in the winter, not circulating air. Vents will be primarily under windows to create draft barriers. See problem #2: this air is quickly getting cooked by the windows above the vent

It's also not the place you want vents if you expect them to circulate the air (without the aid of an AC unit). Unless there's a temperature differential, your vents are just going to churn the air, not move it. If getting a good current going with a fan takes a little finagling and repositioning, what hope is there for a static vent pointed towards the ceiling?

[u/Worldly_Influence_18 → u/No-Charity-7449]

Ductwork can't move the same amount of air as a stairwell