Putting Houseplants in Your Home Keeps the Air Quality High

Having houseplants in your home gives you more than a touch of the natural world. They also help clean your indoor air and when the weather isn’t conducive to having the windows open, you can rely on some types of plants to pull unhealthy chemicals common in most homes. The polluting culprits are called volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and they come from myriad products, including cleaning supplies, furniture, flooring, dry cleaning, cosmetics, paint and many more.

Depend on these houseplants to remove these specific VOCs:

• Aloe vera. All you need is a bit of direct sunshine for an aloe to flourish, but use a light touch with the watering. These succulents remove benzene and formaldehyde. The former comes from vehicle exhaust and the latter from many household products, including cleaning supplies.
• Spider plant. This plant grows easily and tolerates a good deal of neglect. When it’s well-cared for, however, it sends out tiny spider plants with white flowers. The spider plant removes xylene, formaldehyde and even carbon monoxide (CO), although it’s no substitute for a CO detector or using combustion appliances or fuel-burning devices indoors safely.
• Golden pothos. The lush leaves on the pothos make it an attractive hanging plant and it also grows well in low-light conditions. It removes formaldehyde and grows vigorously.
• Ficus. Also called a weeping fig, this plant may go through shock when you first bring it home, but once it’s adjusted, it’s one of the better houseplants in your home for removing VOCs, especially if you need a larger accent plant. It’ll remove formaldehyde, benzene and trichloroethylene, found in dry-cleaned clothes and some solvents.
• Bamboo palm. If you’re planning on new furniture, use this plant nearby to filter the formaldehyde it will probably out-gas. It thrives in low-light conditions and produces small berries.

If houseplants in your home aren’t a convenient option to improve indoor air quality, contact the experts at Paschal Heat, Air & Geothermal. We can help you discover other ways to clean and maintain healthy indoor air. We’ve provided outstanding HVAC services for Northwest Arkansas homeowners since 1968.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in Springdale, Arkansas about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about indoor air quality and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

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