Venting Electric Dryer Into Attic

Sometimes such as in town homes or condos it s not possible to vent a dryer through a wall outside.

Venting electric dryer into attic.

Not all dryers will allow for this so be sure to check the owners manual to ensure it can be vented in this manner. It literally rains on the insulation. For every 90 degree turn and 2 1 2 feet for every 45 degree turn for dryer vent installation. Wrap insulation around duct pipes that run through the crawl space or the attic.

This helps keep the pipes clean by preventing condensation. A dryer vent should be vented outside. Duct and subtract 5 ft. But we don t recommend it for two reasons.

Venting the dryer outside in cold weather wastes a lot of heat. Use no more than 25 ft. The photo below shows an accumulation of dryer lint in an attic after years of the vent terminating in it. Keep in mind these rules of thumb.

Doing so would fill your attic with warm moist air that could rot the framing. Where changes of direction are required use 4 inch aluminum elbows. When venting dryers for long distances use rigid metal pipe with as few elbows as possible. However condensation collected in the low spots of the flexible hose.

This is unsatisfactory because of the lint and because the hot dryer air condenses when it hits the cold attic air. Be careful you don t cut through any studs electrical wires or pipes in the process. Recently we have simply vented the dryer into the attic. In these cases it may be necessary to vent your dryer through the attic.

To make the dyer more efficient you can buy an inexpensive heat diverter and install it in the exhaust duct of electric dryers only not gas dryers you ll save about 50 worth of heat per load in the winter. The shorter the distance and fewer the turns the better for dryer vent installation. Clean the vent periodically to prevent lint build up. The international residential code allows you to run a dryer vent through the attic but you can t terminate it there.

For dryer venting use 4 inch smooth wall aluminum pipe. If venting outside isn t an option you can vent the dryer out of the attic through the roof using a special roof vent to keep rain out.