How to Reduce the Heat in My Attic?

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

If you’ve noticed your attic is baking on a hot summer’s day, you’re probably wondering how to reduce the heat in my attic. Whether you’re using your attic as storage space, have converted it into an additional room or whether the attic space remains empty, the temperature in your attic can have several negative effects.

Why Is a Hot Attic Bad?

If your attic is too hot it can affect the energy performance around your entire home. Not only can this have an impact on your comfort levels, but it can also lead to higher energy bills.

Heat in the attic can be a contributing factor to harmful mold growth. Mold growth happens particularly if the heat is accompanied by humidity.

It can also damage your roof. This can subsequently result in costly repairs, and damage to items stored in the attic. Extreme temperatures can also be hazardous if you have electrical wires in the attic.

With average highs of 95 degrees Fahrenheit throughout summer in the Dallas and Fort Worth area, and with the hot season running from June to September, it’s important to make sure your attic isn’t too hot.

It’s not only summertime that can bring problems, though; if your attic is too warm in the winter months it can lead to ice damming on your roof. This can cause water to pool on your roof, which can then leak into your home and cause mold and rot. It can damage roof tiles and shingles and detach gutters.  

Why Does My Attic Become So Hot?

Hot air is less dense than cold air. Heat, therefore, rises. Any heat produced in your home, for example from lights, ovens, dryers, and other electrical appliances, rises to the highest point: your attic.

On a hot day, attics heat up further due to the sun’s rays beating down on the roof. In many cases, hot air becomes at least partially trapped in the attic, resulting in a layer of heat at the top of your home.    

What is the Optimum Temperature for My Attic?

There should only be about a 10- to 20-degree variation between your attic temperature and the temperature outdoors in an ideal situation. You can keep a thermometer in your attic to easily check.

How to Reduce the Heat in My Attic?

Now you know why your attic heats up and how this can be harmful, it’s time to look at some solutions for lowering the heat in your attic.

When searching for “ways to reduce the heat in my attic”, you should consider both how to initially remove the heat and lower the temperature and, ongoing, how to ensure your attic remains cooler.  

Ventilation

Good ventilation is essential for keeping your attic cool. While most homes are built with a specified number of vent openings based on local building codes, adding more ventilation can drastically help to lower internal temperatures.

Attic Fan

Powered by solar energy, you won’t incur increased utility bills from running the fan. Even better, your bills will likely decrease due to your home becoming more energy efficient.

Landscaping

Strategically planted trees that shade the top of your home can help to reduce the attic temperature. While trees cannot remove heat that’s already accumulated in your roof space, they can block further heat from the sun.   

Roofing

Lighter-colored roofing materials can help to lower the roof temperature, which can, in turn, lower the temperature in the attic. Coated shingles made from asphalt reflect more sunlight than traditional shingles, helping to reduce the amount of heat that can enter your property. Metal roofs are another possibility; they generally reflect heat and reduce the amount of heat transference into the ceiling.  

Windows

You can prevent the amount of heat entering your home and subsequently rising into your attic by closing the curtains. This stops sunlight from directly coming into your house. Ensuring that your windows and doors are properly sealed can also reduce the amount of hot air that can come inside.  

Contact a professional to add extra vents and a roof exhaust to enhance the natural circulation of air throughout your home and reduce the temperature in your attic.

For a more active way of easily reducing the heat in your attic, a solar fan is ideal.

Solar fans can be automatically operated with a thermostat, meaning the fan starts running when the temperature reaches a certain point and then shut off once the attic is cooled.  

As well as cooling your home and lowering your energy bills, solar fans can:

• Lower the risk of mold
• Reduce the risk of ice dam formation
• Help protect your roof and increase your roof’s life span

When fitted by experts from Energy Attic, solar fans come already assembled and conveniently take less than an hour to install in your home.   

Insulation

Adequate insulation helps to keep your home cooler on hot days and warmer during cold spells.

Reflective insulation, such as a radiant barrier, is especially effective in cooling attics in homes in hot locations. As the name suggests, a radiant barrier essentially blocks heat from entering the home by reflecting sunlight away from your property. When your roof and walls cannot absorb heat, it can prevent the internal temperature from rising.

Energy Attic’s insulation services include the installation of radiant barriers. Nontoxic and maintenance free, materials comply with several product standards, including:

• Corrosion resistance
• Low flammability
• Fungi resistance
• Tear resistance

Importantly, the radiant barriers meet the smoke and fire safety requirements for most national, state and local building codes.  

Additionally, the insulation doesn’t provide space for pests or rodents to build nests and the material doesn’t interfere with a cell phone or internet signals.