Stop Mold Growth in Wet Basements
When your basement becomes wet as a result of a broken water pipe, a faulty foundation, or wet spills, mold has the potential to grow, and can result in problems with your health and your home. To stop mold growth and to prevent mold from growing in your wet basement, you must take steps to ventilate your basement and allow it to dry completely as soon as the area becomes wet. Continue reading this article to learn more about the many ways in which you can stop mold from growing in a wet basement.
Steps
- Ventilate your wet basement. Promoting air flow will help dry out your basement and stop mold growth. To ventilate your basement, you can open doors, windows, or place oscillating fans throughout your basement.
- Remove soft, wet items from your basement immediately. Soft items that are wet or damp can maintain the moisture and humidity level in your basement, leading to mold growth. Examples of soft, wet items you should remove are clothes, books and newspapers, carpets, cardboard boxes, and other similar items.
- Verify that the vent for your clothes dryer is releasing air outside of your home. If your clothes dryer vent is clogged or backed up, or does not lead to the outside, it could be contributing to mold growth in your basement.
- Go outside while your clothes dryer is running to verify that air is being properly released through the vent. If not, you may need to use tools to open the dryer vent and remove lint and other materials that could be blocking airflow.
- Insulate your basement pipes or windows to prevent condensation in cold, outdoor temperatures. If your basement continues to stay wet as a result of water or ice forming on pipes and windows, you may be promoting mold growth.
- Use pipe sleeves, fiberglass, or other insulation materials to wrap your pipes or cover your windows to prevent condensation in cold or freezing outdoor temperatures.
- Run a dehumidifier in your wet basement. A dehumidifier will remove excess moisture from the air and help prevent high humidity levels and mold growth.
- Set your dehumidifier to run when your basement's humidity is over 60 percent. Mold growth can stop when your basement's overall humidity level drops below 60 percent.
- Verify that rainwater is directed away from your home and basement. If rainwater continues to enter your basement from the outside, mold growth can occur.
- Make sure your gutters and drainage pipes are free of debris, and pointed away from the house.
- Check to see that your outside grounds slope away from your home. When the grounds surrounding your home are level, or higher than your home, water is most likely seeping into and entering your basement.
- Work with a contractor to have the outside grounds sloped away from your home, or add heaps of soil to the grounds against your home. Your house should sit at least 5 feet (1.52 m) higher than the rest of the grounds surrounding your home.
- Remove plants from your wet basement. The moist soil in your plants can spread mold spores and promote mold growth in your basement.
- Vacuum all the surfaces in your basement using a vacuum with a High-Efficiency Particulate Air (HEPA) filter. A vacuum with a HEPA filter will help remove any existing mold spores from the air and from surfaces in your wet basement.
