Summer travel is back with a vengeance and as most seasoned travelers know by now bed bugs can find you anywhere you might go.
Whether in a 5-star Hotel or Resort, Motel, Inn, Lodge, Retreat Center, Airbnb or a shared room in a youth hostel bed bugs do not discriminate.
Since 2012 when we sold our very first electric hotel bed bug heater to the small Lafayette Hotel in Marietta Ohio our lodging customers continue to report back to us that it was one of the best investments they ever made. Read our customer’s thoughtful reviews here.
Incidents of bed bugs continue to rise worldwide as reported by almost anyone who touches this issue professionally like hoteliers, pest control companies, facilities managers and property managers. Bed bugs continue to develop resistance to the available pesticides which actually makes matters worse since pesticide resistant bed bugs pass it onto their offspring resulting in pesticides becoming even less effective over time.
Heat has been proven time and time again to be the simplest, safest and most effective method for killing bed bugs, bed bug nymphs and bed bug eggs in one treatment averaging 5-7 hours in an average sized hotel room.
How long it takes for an effective heat treatment depends on room size, how cold or hot it is outside and if you have pre-heated the room using the room heater or PTAC. That means that if you start heating treating a room using a bed bug room heater first thing in the morning it can be occupied by a paying guest that night. No more lost revenue due to ‘Out of Service’ rooms which is one of the enormous hidden costs of using pesticides which require multiple applications over weeks. What is the lost revenue math on one of your 'Out of Service' rooms for 3 weeks?
PestPro Thermal has taken a unique approach in engineering it’s bed bug heaters for lodging establishments. Instead of trying to use every power source in the room we decided to keep things simple and zero in on the PTAC receptacles which have the most power. A PTAC is a combined AC and Heater device which typically uses 220/240v power but can also use 208v or 277v. PestPro Thermal Systems offers its heaters for all these property voltages.
Our Hotel Heater plugs into two PTAC receptacles simultaneously. See diagram below.
If your property does not use PTAC units then purchase our standard Heater which plugs into one, dedicated NEMA 14-50R receptacle connected to a 60amp circuit breaker in your electrical panel.
If your PTACS are 20 amp then the heater can treat up to 360 square feet.
If your PTACS are 30 amp the heater can treat up to 400 square feet.
We also feel strongly given our customer feedback that separate fans, versus built-in fans, give you much more flexibility to direct the super heated air where it needs to go, to more effectively penetrate the items where bed bugs hide. Bed bugs mostly like to hide in mattresses, box springs, side tables, headboards (should be removed from wall) and anything else with fabric and seams.
For those owning and managing lodging properties the advantages of owning your own bed bug heater are straight forward.
PestPro Thermal customers now consider their bed bug heat equipment like any other mission critical piece of equipment like a Speed Queen washer or dryer. It gives them the control they need to discreetly deal with an unmentionable issue in a quick, simple and cost-effective way. Owning the best bed bug heater not only allows you to deal with the situation quickly but it will save you money in the long run given that bed bugs are here to stay.
Protect your reputation from negative reviews that never go away.
Protect your team members health, your guest’s health and your health from repeated indoor applications of pesticides which by design have residual presence and unknown negative health consequences.
Protect your pocketbook from endless pesticide applications.
Protect your furniture from ever needing to be thrown away.
One of the added benefits of heating your rooms up to 135° F is that dry heat kills odor producing molds and mildews.
Electric bed bug heaters for sale and their high volume fans are used for minor flooding events so you don't have to call in expensive and time consuming flood remediation companies.
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Although bed bugs have been documented in human history as early as 400 BC in ancient Greek texts there has been a recent resurgence of bed bugs that started about 20 years ago.
Along with the comeback of these despicable insects there has been a mad dash to figure out how best to get rid of them.
Bed bugs were all but eliminated after the end of WWII with the effective and widespread use of DDT, but at considerable cost to environmental health.
Once DDT was banned from use due to environmental concerns in 1972 the pesticide industry was forced to become more creative and develop safer ways to combat all insects including bed bugs.
At first, the initial classes of EPA approved pesticides were very effective in killing bed bugs but then normal evolutionary processes started happening. Bed bugs eventually developed resistance to the pesticides designed to kill them similar to the way human bacterium have developed resistance to the antibiotics designed to kill them
The outdated pesticides have now become annoyances to bed bugs, unless there is direct contact with the bed bugs which causes the bed bugs to scatter to avoid the pesticides. This causes the problem to be less localized, in maybe one bedroom or unit, and more widespread especially in multi-unit buildings.
The pesticide-resistant adult bed bugs pass their resistance on to their bed bug children via their DNA who then pass it on to their children.
An arms race of sorts has ensued between the bed bugs and the toxic pesticide manufacturers.
The pesticide companies continue to fail at developing new formulations that will kill bed bugs and the EPA has fallen behind in approving new classes of pesticides that kill bugs.
High profile bed bug infestations, including those that affect top athletes and other celebrities continue to be in the headlines resulting in specialized class-action law firms winning bigger and bigger awards and settlements from property owners.
Using a bed bug heat machine has been scientifically proven to be the best method for killing bed bugs quickly and safely.
There are other non-pesticide methods being developed like using genetically engineered poisonous spores from fungi that the bed bugs bring back to the bed bug cluster which poison them. Although the results have been promising this is not the quickest, surest way to kill bed bugs quickly and in one treatment session when time is money. Heat is still your best bet for quick and effective bed bug elimination.
Another important factor to consider when deciding the best way to kill bed bugs is the growing trend for younger families who resist spraying chemicals where they live and sleep.
Seniors are also pushing back as they develop chemical sensitivities and allergies with age. Caregivers are more often requesting non-chemical solutions now than in the past.
The trust that the government will protect one against consumer dangers like harmful pesticides has been eroded when compared to older generations who grew up with RAID commercials on TV and cartoon cockroaches being blown up on the screen. The movement towards eliminating toxic chemicals of all types from our daily lives is real and heat is as natural a way to kill bed bugs as you can get.
Steam, freezing, vacuuming and trapping are all great ways to kill bed bugs on the surface of things when you can see them crawling around.
The problem with these visual methods are that bed bugs are expert at staying hidden and laying their eggs out of site. It is proven to be virtually impossible for anyone with a steam or freezing wand to kill all bed bugs and their unhatched eggs in drawers of clothes, tightly packed closets, behind baseboards and any living space where clutter and hoarding might be an issue.
Bed bugs cannot develop a resistance to heat the way they have developed a resistance to pesticides.
Heat kills bed bugs every time they are exposed to it, no ifs ands or buts.
The trick lies in making sure to expose bed bugs to a high enough temperature for a long enough period of time and making sure they do not have escape routes by physically blocking all exits with blue painters tape, caulking and covering vents with plastic.
Entomologists the world over all agree that adult bed bugs will die when exposed to 114°F for at least 20 minutes. The hotter the temperature, the quicker they perish.
To kill bed bug eggs requires slightly higher temperatures for longer periods of time because they tend to be located in more protected, insulated areas like mattresses, bedding, clutter or other fabrics. Heat will penetrate these items unlike pesticides which can only be sprayed on the surface.
Bed bugs prefer the room temperature to be warm. That is why they tend to take up residence in anything that is plugged into an electrical outlet. They will choose to live in TVs, stereos, video gaming devices as well as electrical outlets and light switches themselves.
Once the temperature gets too hot for them bed bugs will try to crawl away from the heat to a cooler place.
The best way to kill bed bugs inside the items in which they are hiding is to quickly introduce heat while simultaneously moving the hot air around them using a high volume recirculation fan. If the room is small enough you do not even need a separate fan as a good electric bed bug room heater will move enough air with it's internal fan.
Because the bed bugs are surrounded by the hot, swirling air they have no way of determining where the heat it is coming from and therefore cannot run away from it.
Bear in mind that bed bug heating equipment is engineered to achieve temperatures much higher than the maximum 80-90° F temperatures of heaters sold to keep people warm.
The recirculation fans used in bed bug heat remediation are outfitted with high temperature electronic components allowing them to function in temperatures up to 180F. Normal fans including carpet drying fans will overheat and their electric motors will fail in the higher temperatures required to kill bed bugs. Using non-heat-rated fans is not advisable when performing heat treatments to kill bed bugs.
In addition to a heater and recirculation fan, a third component is a wireless temperature monitoring system which is very helpful but not an absolute requirement when killing bed bugs with heat.
A separate temperature monitoring system allows you to view a readout of the temperatures inside the treatment area while you are comfortably outside the treatment area. This is the best way to check for and avoid “cold spots” although many folks just use an infrared heat gun for this purpose. The only obvious downside to using a heat gun is you let heat out every time you open a door to go inside or exit the treatment area which of course slows down how long it takes to perform a bed bug heat treatment job.
Bed bugs can sense cold spots and will go towards them to survive. It is critical to create the most even temperature profile possible in the area being treated. For optimal results the temperature from one sensor to the next should stay within 10 degrees of one another.
If a sensor is more than 10 degrees different from other sensors you will need to make adjustments in the form of: repositioning a fan or the heater, repositioning furniture or all of the above. This is a critical piece of the puzzle to achieve success and is the primary reason it is best to use separate recirculation fans which can redirect the hot air for optimal results.
Plastic, budget heaters have built-in fans and are unable to direct the hot air to where it needs to go as effectively as a separate, external recirculation fan. Also, extension ducts can be attached to separate recirculation fans which can direct hot air into hard to reach places like crawl spaces, deep closets or drop-down ceilings.
One last thing worth mentioning if you kill bed bugs for a living is this. Do you want to be able to maintain and repair your electric bed bug heaters yourself or be reliant on the company that sold them to you to do so? If time is money and you answered the former then be sure to purchase equipment that uses open source parts available anywhere (i.e. Amazon, Grainger. or McMaster-Carr) from a company that can easily walk you through simple parts replacement.
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25MAR 2020 Page 6 Heat Kills Virus – Stanford Medicine Study
15APR 2020 NIH study.
27MAY 2020 POLICE USE HEATER TO KILL COVID-19 IN FORD INTERCEPTOR CRUISERS INTERIORS - CNN, FORD
"This system is better than just cleaning the inside of the car with disinfectant spray because the heat permeates the entire occupant compartment. Germs are killed even in hard-to-reach areas and there's no chance of any places being accidentally overlooked", a Ford spokesman said.
As of today, the Covid-19 virus is still on an upswing and infections and deaths continue to climb worldwide.
The virus is forcing the worlds most talented and ingenious people to switch gears from whatever they were doing before the outbreak to come up with creative ways to “flatten the curve” of infections.
Once the curve is flattened there will need to be global efforts to make sure that if the virus mutates, we are not faced with a follow-on pandemic.
Entire industries are adapting and retooling so they can manufacture medical equipment required to protect our first responders and medical personnel, save lives and vanquish this deadly foe.
Since the start of the pandemic in the US and Canada I have fielded numerous phone calls from our hotel and lodging customers who are faced with a real challenge.
These customers are receiving requests from their public health departments to house not only the front line health care workers but also individuals who need to be quarantined, like the homeless, who have been identified as having been exposed to the virus through contact with infected people.
These customers are calling to ask if their electric bed bug heaters, typically used to kill bed bugs and other pests, will get the hotel rooms hot enough to kill the virus.
Until just a few days ago I did not have an answer to this question and am still trying to remain careful in what I communicate around this specific topic.
On March 25th Stanford University’s School of Medicine released the results of a study they performed. They were trying to confirm at what temperature you would need to heat N95 protective masks to kill Covid-19 and not degrade the mask so they could be safely reused.
Although this study is specific to decontaminating medical face masks the conclusions carry over into other areas of discussion given they have determined what temperature and length of time will kill the virus.
The study concluded that exposing the N95 face masks to 158° F for 30 minutes will most likely kill the virus while preserving the structural integrity of the masks so they can be used again.
Other methods were tested and determined to degrade the masks too much and were therefore not recommended for decontamination. See the red areas on page 5 of the study.
PestPro Thermal Systems manufactures and sells electric bed bug heaters to its customers who use them primarily to kill bed bugs, other insects and molds/mildew which tend to die quickly when exposed to temperatures of around 120° F.
The heaters have automatic thermostats installed that are pre-set at the factory to top out at 145° F. This is the temperature that will penetrate furniture and personal items most effectively without damaging low cost items like budget vinyl blinds and cheap particle board, glued furniture.
We have helped customers reprogram their automatic thermostats to achieve temperatures of as high as 160° for non-standard uses like commercial scale pottery and ceramic curing rooms, fire and flood remediation and municipal buses and trains.
Completely decontaminating living areas like hotel rooms of the Covid-19 virus before someone new can safely and confidently move-in will take multiple tools and methods.
One of these tools for hard, non-porous surfaces, like table tops and bathrooms, will of course be spray disinfectants and moistened wipes. For porous, not-hard, fabric covered items another tool can be whole room heaters that can raise the temperature of a living area to 158° F for as long as needed.
One advantage a whole room heater offers is the ability of heat to penetrate all the nooks and crannies and fabric covered items like furniture and bedding.
You cannot spray Lysol or Clorox bleach inside a mattress, box spring or upholstered chair.
Consider your whole-room bed bug heaters as another arrow in the quiver against Covid-19 and please be careful out there.
One important item to mention before treating your rooms with these higher temperatures: fire sprinkler lines need to be turned off during treatment and sprinkler heads need to be covered using a styrofoam, outdoor faucet cover, available in any lawn and garden department.
You can call or text us at 970-443-8229 if you have additional questions about our equipment including how to reset your thermostat to the higher temperatures mentioned in this post.
If you are an existing PestPro Thermal customer, the video below will walk you through how to reprogram your automatic thermostat to enable your heater to achieve the higher temperatures mentioned in this post.
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