What We Think We Know About Ventilation

Published

September 1, 2005

Author(s)

Andrew K. Persily

Abstract

The amount of outdoor air provided to occupied spaces is one of the most important determinants of indoor air quality, but many critical questions and misunderstandings still exist regarding outdoor air ventilation. First, given the importance of ventilation, how well do we know how much outdoor air is even needed in buildings? While research has been done on ventilation and odor perception and on ventilation and symptom prevalence, is it adequate to support the ventilation requirements in our standards and regulations? While this research and many years of designing and operating buildings have been used to develop ventilation requirements in standards and regulations, these requirements treat all buildings the same. Can we provide understandable and practical ventilation requirements that address the tremendous variability in buildings and occupants? While much time and effort is spent developing and debating ventilation requirements, compliance with these requirements in design and ultimately operation is rarely given the attention that it deserves. Determination and control of actual ventilation performance in buildings requires measurement, which is extremely difficult to conduct in the field and is too often omitted from building management practice, as well as indoor air quality research. Ventilation measurements often reveal significant gaps between design intent and actual performance with serious implications for both indoor air quality and energy. Given the importance of ventilation, the research that has been done and the many questions that remain, it is reasonable to ponder how much we really know about ventilation.

Proceedings Title

Indoor Air 2005

Conference Dates

September 4-9, 2005

Conference Location

Bejing, CN

Conference Title

The 10th International Conference on IAQ and climate

Pub Type

Conferences

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Keywords

airflow, building codes, indoor air quality, measurement, regulation standards, ventilation

Citation

Persily, A. (2005), What We Think We Know About Ventilation, Indoor Air 2005, Bejing, CN, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=860983 (Accessed April 24, 2024)