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Is it possible to attach a diverter to an electric clothes dryer vent so it can help heat my house in the winter? Seems like such a waste to blow it all outside. I imagine you'd need some sort of filter or maybe a radiant heating option.

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    Unless you are using your dryer a whole lot don't bother. The moisture and dust are really bad for allergies, and making it safe requires expense in excess of any savings you'll get
    – GdD
    Nov 9, 2012 at 11:08
  • There are not enough BTUs to scavenge which would make this cost effective enough. You would also need to bypass the system in the warm months. Nov 26, 2015 at 16:12

5 Answers 5

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Dryer vent air is full of water vapor and dust. I wouldn't want to blow it into my house.

I do not know how much heat (BTU's) a dryer outputs during a run but it seems like it would be a small amount, and of course most people don't run their dryer very often - maybe a handful of times a week.

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    Agreed, the excess humidity causes all the wood in your home to swell, windows to fog up, and encourages mold and mildew growth. A little extra humidity from a humidifier isn't that bad, but a dryer is a lot of extra humidity, and lint.
    – BMitch
    Nov 8, 2012 at 22:24
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    It would depend on your climate. Here in Ohio it gets so dry in the Winter that all the extra humidity may be a good thing. A whole family can take long hot showers without venting and it hardly makes a dent on the humidity level in the house. Would be an interesting experiment, you're not going to get more humidity than there is water left in the clothes after the spin cycle, that's really the deciding factor. Nov 9, 2012 at 13:37
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    Unless you're running the air through the same filtration that's used for HVAC, before venting it into the house, you're in for a mess. Lint filters don't take out the fine dust that dryers produce. For the same reason, any sort of heat exchanger unit will require air going into it to be thoroughly filtered as dust accumulation destroys the heat exchange efficiency. Nov 9, 2012 at 16:04
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    Why is everyone talking about the humidity as a huge problem? In drier climates this could be useful. Here in New York in the winter, I run multiple humidifiers 24/7 just to get the bare minimum humidity I need to avoid daily nosebleeds. So, the idea that I'm pumping lots of hot, humid air outside every time I run my dryer feels awfully wasteful. If only I could filter out the lint better, keeping that air and humidity inside seems like a big win.
    – Josh
    Feb 26, 2019 at 21:01
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Yes. You can get an indoor lint collector that allows you to vent the dryer exhaust indoors. They're simple and cheap but also direct all of your dryer exhaust into your house, including all the moisture.

A more expensive option is a full heat exchanger which attempts to just transfer the heat and nothing else. You have to filter the lint first, however, or you're going to clog the exchanger.

There are dangers associated with recovering heat this way (NDSU 2008). Be sure you're familiar with them.

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    I had a diverter with a lint filter hooked up for a while and found that the hot air had way too much moisture and started using it only on the last quarter or so of the dry cycle. Even with the lint filter, it created a lot of dust in the house. We ended up removing it
    – TomG
    Nov 9, 2012 at 0:25
  • Depending on where you live, venting a dryer indoor is a big no no. Just because a product exists, does not mean that product should/can be used.
    – Tester101
    Nov 9, 2012 at 13:01
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    The lint collector doesn't remove the finer particulate that tumbling clothes produces. You end up with a fine layer of it all over everything where the dryer exhausts. I've been battling this for years as the dryer vented onto our front door walkway and the mechanical spider output far exceeds the cobwebs that the live ones produce. I finally cut a hole in the garage door, installed a slip coupling and blow it out onto the driveway, which is ok as long as no cars are sitting in front of it. New dryer, fine lint filter, still problems. Nov 9, 2012 at 16:10
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    Not sure what that last link (a Yahoo answers page) adds to the answer. I don't see any authoritative sources, just a bunch of random people claiming "THIS IS DANGEROUS!". A heat exchanger, with proper filtering (and regular cleaning of the filters, and periodic cleaning of the exchanger) should safely get the heat into the home and the moist air out.
    – Doktor J
    Mar 28, 2017 at 20:45
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    It seems like an obvious thing to do is to heat the incoming dryer air from the outgoing air using a heat exchanger. Unlike your house, you always want this to be warm. No such thing seems to exist, though.
    – Lutorm
    Aug 24, 2018 at 21:55
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Here in Wisconsin we do it just as Billy alluded to: a filtered bypass vent. You can use the damper to bleed off a little or a lot of the hot air/moist air into the home. The units are around $20. Be advised that you should place a fan or other means of circulating the moist air, as it will make your dryer room VERY moist if not pushed out into other areas. As with all things there is no pat answer. Use diligence and it will help. It is not a open and run 100% of the time option though if you do multiple loads for a medium/large family...

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It seems that many of the people here are simply answering based on their personal experience for their particular scenario. Fact is, in the winter most homes NEED more humidity hence the reason people by humidifiers that they run in the winter time. So to say that it’s not a good idea because of the moisture is NOT applicable in all situations. During the winter (which is when you would be using your dryers heat to heat the home) is when the extra moisture would be welcomed in most cases. So you can’t simply say it’s not a good idea because of moisture. It’s just not true. You have to look at each scenario based on its on merits. Determine weather or not your home would benefit from the added moisture generated from the dryer and then make YOUR decision based on YOUR needs, not some blanket response. There are two things that are definite though. One is that this is only to be done with ELECTRIC dryers and the other is to have some form of lint filtration method employed which is a totally separate issue from the moisture issue and should be addressed independently from the moisture issue. I have NOT done the research on using this method on gas dryers simply because my dryer is electric but I am certain that if you have the time and money to invest in some sort of method to eliminate and natural gas from the heated air before you vent it into your home it most certainly exists. As far as the lint issue goes there are filters available down to .5 microns which will filter out the lint with no trouble but make sure you replace/wash them accordingly. There is actually a product designed specifically for this application. It’s called “Dryer Net” from demo air net. Here is the link. http://dryernet.com/ So that takes care of the lint issue provided you do what is required of you to maintain it. Then you can decide weather you need to address the humidity issue or if you would benefit from it. There are plenty of websites you can visit to help you determine how to check the humidity level in your home and what if anything you need to do to lower or raise it. Always consider any specific health issues when determining weather or not your home needs more or less humidity. What’s good for one person’s health may not be good for another, so make sure you take EVERYONE’S needs into consideration when making the decision. If you decide that you need to address the humidity situation before you vent the heat into your home then and in-line duct dehumidifier should take care of that as well. They range in price from around $200 to over $2,000 depending on what you need it to do but in the case of a dryer vent you should be fine with the $200 price range units available from most home stores such as Sears. In addition to these two products there are also in-line “air valves” that can control the air flow during those times you do NOT want the heat directed into your home. Simply install the in-line valve and when you want heat to be directed into the home you open the valve to the correct position to send the heat into the home or close the valve to direct the heat to your normal exhausting direction. Bottom line is YES you can safely and effectively use your dryer to heat your home provided you do a little research and determine what YOU need to do for YOUR specific application. In the process you can save yourself about $25 to $40 a month in heating costs thus paying for the items purchased and time used to install them over the long haul. Generally speaking if you save an average of $30 a month in heating costs by purchasing $240 worth of products the items will pay for themselves in only 8 months of usage. If you make use of your dryer for 4 months out of the year to help heat your home by the third year you will be putting money in the bank and we all love that. Hope this helps those of you who want an answer that isn’t a blanket answer offered by previous responders to this question. Not to knock them, they most likely simply did not consider all the variables in the question therefore answered off the hip versus actual research done on the products made to do this EXACT function. Good luck and happy heating. I’m staying toasty warm in my bedroom while my clothes are drying in the laundry room.

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    too long, didn't read. line breaks and paragraphs would help greatly.
    – Steven
    Mar 14, 2013 at 2:02
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    @billy Are you affiliated in any way with the product you linked to? Our community doesn't take kindly to self promotion (see our FAQ), especially promotion of products that aren't listed or labeled by any standards organization.
    – Tester101
    Mar 14, 2013 at 14:04
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    on their personal experience Heh, can't beat personal experience, if 50 people jump off a cliff and only 3 come out unscathed, then you can empirically say it's a bad idea. Recovering heat from dryers is not a new idea, implemented poorly, it's a fire hazard, dust hazard, mold hazard, rot hazard and a pulmonary health hazard. Most of the people who've tried it didn't have the filtration, and one or two I've known who actually thought out the filtration found the back pressure caused a fire hazard in the dryer or burnt out the thermal fuse in the process. Otherwise TLDR; Dec 14, 2013 at 2:45
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Here's a thought: what if you didn't put clothes in the dryer and then there would be no moisture, just heat. Or put a small amount in and you can regulate how much moisture is released.

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    Darn inefficient heating... Good in a pinch maybe, but very expensive way of heating. Might as well turn the oven in the kitchen range on high with the door open and use that. Dec 13, 2013 at 3:07
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    Dryers are designed to run with clothes in them, running them empty could damage the appliance.
    – Tester101
    Dec 13, 2013 at 13:34

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