Ventilation

Ventilation of buildings is required to supply fresh air for respiration of occupants, to dilute
inside air to prevent vitiation by body odours and to remove any products of combustion or
other contaminants in air and to provide such thermal environments as will assist in the
maintenance of heat balance of the body in order to prevent discomfort and injury to health of
the occupants.
Ventilation is the process of supplying and removing air by natural or mechanical means to
and from a workplace. It is essential to ensure that adequate ventilation is provided to a
workplace, especially in an enclosed building. General ventilation is designed to provide
fresh air for breathing by the occupants, control of thermal conditions and keeping the air free
from contaminants (such as tobacco smoke, body odour and other air-borne contaminants).
The fresh air intake points of a ventilation system should be away from any source of
contaminants. In the planning stage of a building, the ventilation design should meet the
minimum requirements of the Building (Ventilating Systems) Regulations. To prevent
accumulation of air-borne contaminants in the work area, mechanical exhaust ventilation is
required to remove the impurities in air and to discharge them properly. In specially
hazardous operations, a local exhaust system may be required to effectively control
atmospheric contamination at its source. Exhaust ventilation should be arranged in such a
way that cross ventilation is achieved and contaminants are blown away from the workers.

Benefits of Natural Ventilation

The use of natural ventilation is definitely an advantage with the raising concerns regarding
the cost and environmental impact of energy use. Not only does natural ventilation provide
ventilation (outdoor air) to ensure safe healthy and comfortable conditions for building
occupants without the use of fans, it also provides free cooling without the use of mechanical
systems.
When carefully designed, natural ventilation can reduce building construction costs and
operation costs and reduce the energy consumption for air-conditioning and circulating fans.
An additional bonus is that no longer will any noisy fan be of your concern.

Recommended Values for Air Changes

The standards of general ventilation are recommended/ based on maintenance of required

oxygen, carbon dioxide and other air quality levels and for the control of body odours when
no products of combustion or other contaminants are present in the air the values of air
changes in case of Offices is 6-10 Air Change per Hour.
Methods of Ventilation
General ventilation involves providing a building with relatively large quantities of outside
air in order to improve general environment of the building. This may be achieved in one of
the following ways:
a) Natural supply and natural exhaust of air
b) Natural supply and mechanical exhaust of air;
c) Mechanical supply and natural exhaust of air,
d) Mechanical supply and mechanical exhaust of air.

Natural Ventilation
The rate of ventilation by natural means through windows or other openings depends on:
a) direction and velocity of wind outside and sizes and disposition of openings (wind action),
and
b) convection effects arising from temperature of vapour pressure difference (or both)
between inside and outside the room and the difference of height between the outlet and inlet
openings (stack effect).

Types of Natural Ventilation and their Design Considerations.

Wind Driven Ventilation

As naturally occurring wind blows across a building, the wind hits the windward wall causing
a direct positive pressure. The wind moves around the building and leaves the leeward wall
with a negative pressure, also known as a sucking effect. If there are any openings on the
windward and leeward walls of the building, fresh air will rush in the windward wall opening
and exit the leeward wall opening to balance and relieve the pressures on the windward and
leeward walls.

A building need not necessarily be oriented perpendicular to the prevailing outdoor wind; It
may be oriented at any convenient angle between 0° and 30° without loosing any beneficial
aspect of the breeze. If the prevailing wind is from East or West, building may be oriented at
45° to the incident wind so as to diminish the solar heat without much reduction in air motion
indoors. Inlet openings in the buildings should be well distributed and should be located on
the windward side at a low level, and outlet openings should be located on the leeward side.
Inlet and outlet openings at high levels may only clear the top air at that level without
producing air movement at the level of occupancy.
It may be oriented at any convenient angle between 0° and 30° without loosing any beneficial
aspect of the breeze. If the prevailing wind is from East or West, building may be oriented at
45° to the incident wind so as to diminish the solar heat without much reduction in air motion
indoors.
Inlet openings in the buildings should be well distributed and should be located on the
windward side at a low level, and outlet openings should be located on the leeward side.
Inlet and outlet openings at high levels may only clear the top air at that level without
producing air movement at the level of occupancy.
Maximum air movement at a particular plane is achieved by keeping the sill height if the
opening at 85 percent of the critical height (such as head level) for the following
recommended levels of occupancy:
1) For sitting on chair 0.75 m,
Inlet openings should not as far as possible be obstructed by adjoining buildings, trees etc.
In rooms of normal size having identical windows on opposite walls.
Greatest flow per unit area of openings is obtained by using inlet and outlet openings of
nearby equal areas at the same level.
Where the direction of wind is quite constant and dependable, the size of the inlet should be
kept within 30 to 50 percent of the total area of openings and the building should be oriented
perpendicular to the incident wind.

Stack Ventilation

Natural ventilation by stack effect occurs when air inside a building is at a different
temperature than air outside. Thus in heated buildings or in buildings cool outside air will
tend to enter through openings at low level and warm air will tend to leave through openings
at high level. It would, therefore, be advantageous to provide ventilators as close to ceilings
as possible. Ventilators can also be provided in roofs as, for example, cowl, ventpipe, covered
roof and ridge vent.
Most commonly used is the stack driven ventilation. For stack ventilation to work properly
there must be a temperature difference. As the warm air (usually given off by the occupants
and their computers), which is less dense, in the building rises, the cooler air is sucked from
the openings below. This is shown in the picture below.
Design considerations for stack ventilation

 inlets should supply air low in the room. Outlets should be located across the room
and at high level.

 the vertical distance between the inlet and exhaust openings should take advantage of
the stack effect.

 Use skylights or ridge vents.

 The function as fire exits of enclosed staircases should not be compromised if stack
ventilation is incorporated into the design.

Maintenance

If a mechanical ventilation system is used, regular checks (e.g. annually) should be carried
out to reveal malfunctions and prevent breakdowns.
Visible deposit or dirt on the fans and duct work system is likely to cause health risks and
should be removed. Regular cleaning of the filters, fans and cooling coils of a ventilation
system is essential to ensure efficiency and the occupants' health.

Monitoring of the ventilation system

As the concentration of carbon dioxide increase with human activities, background levels of
other contaminants also increase. In a workplace without a specific source of contamination,
the adequacy of ventilation can be measured indirectly with a carbon dioxide index method.
The adequacy of ventilation should be monitored by checking the carbon dioxide level in the
workplace.

Thermal conditions

In naturally ventilated workplaces, for the best productivity and relative comfort, the
optimum effective temperature (footnote) is below 27degree celcius. In an indoor work
environment, the lower air temperature is preferably maintained at 16 degree celcius or
above.