Airflow and air temperature distribution in the occupied region of an underfloor ventilation system

Measurements were carried out in an office-type experimental room ventilated by a floor return-type underfloor ventilation system to investigate the distributions of airflow velocity and air temperature. A fan-powered floor air unit (FAU) with rectangular supply and return air outlets covered by straight-profile linear bar-type air diffusers was installed to deliver the conditioned air in the experimental room. Turbulence intensity and draught rate distributions inside the room were also calculated by using the measured data. From the experimental results, it is found that undesirable high air velocities and high draught rates were created within a small region near the supply outlet of the FAU. Temperature differences between different height levels were maintained within an acceptable comfort level under the tested supply air conditions and heat loads. The results indicated that the temperature stratification could be maintained at an acceptable comfort level by designing the supply air conditions properly. A clearance zone is suggested as a design consideration for locating the FAUs and occupants to avoid undesirable draught discomfort to the occupants.     

地板送风对流热转移

针对下部有集中热源的地板送风空调小室,利用PHOENICS软件,对多种工况下室内气流流动的速度场和温度场进行了模拟,利用模拟结果计算对流热转移量,得出对流热转移量的变化规律。分析了影响对流热转移量的相关因素,主要是由于送风冷射流与热源的热射流在不同的影响因素下对室内气流流动及温度分布产生影响,从而造成对流热转移量的变化。结果表明:地板送风空调小室的对流热转移量与热源数目、送风口密度、热源强度、送风量4个因素有关;回风口数目对对流热转移量的影响很小,可以忽略不计。     

Air distribution in office environment with asymmetric workstation layout using chilled beams

Air flow patterns and mean air speeds were studied under laboratory conditions representing a full scale open-plan office. Three basic conditions were tested: summer, spring/autumn and winter. Chilled beams were used to provide cooling, outdoor air supply and air distribution in the room. The heat sources had a notable influence on the flow pattern in the room causing large scale circulation and affecting the direction of inlet jets. The maximum air speed in the occupied zone was higher than the recommendations. The mean air speed was also high on at the floor level but low on at the head level. The air speed was highest in the summer case under high cooling load. Results indicate that especially with high heat loads, it is difficult to fulfill the targets of the existing standards in practice. Two main sources of draught risk were found: a) downfall of colliding inlet jets causing local maxima of air speed and b) large scale circulation caused by asymmetric layout of chilled beams and heat sources. The first phenomenon can cause local draught risk when the workstation is located in the downfall area. The flow pattern is not stable and the position of draught risk areas can change in time and also due to changes in room heat sources. The second phenomenon can cause more constant high air speeds on at the floor level. CFD-simulation was able to predict the general flow pattern but somewhat overestimated the air speed compared to measurements.     

A new formula for determining a minimum recommended value of inlet air velocity from UFAD system to prevent occupants from draught risk

During the winter period the natural convection flow along a cold window surface can be the cause of thermal discomfort. Warm air blown into the room near the window prevents occupants from draught risk. The paper presents a new formula for determining a minimum recommended value of inlet air velocity. A balance of a momentum flux of flow of the down draught currents and the warm air jet inflow from the UFAD (under floor air distribution) system was a base for the analytical solution. In order to estimate air movement in a typical room, numerical simulations are executed. A computational model of the room with the UFAD system is constructed within the CFD environment developed by Fluent Inc. Ten cases with varying inlet air parameters and a window U$U$-value are considered. The analytical estimation of minimum inlet air velocity is confirmed by simulation results of temperature and velocity distributions.     

Impact of heat load location and strength on air flow pattern with a passive chilled beam system

A passive chilled beam is a source of natural convection, creating a flow of cold air directly into the occupied zone. Experiments were conducted in a mock-up of an office room to study the air velocities in the occupied spaces. In addition, velocity profiles are registered when underneath heat loads exist and the cool and warm air flows interact. Experimental laboratory study revealed that in the case of the underneath heat gains, even no upward plume was generated and the dummy only acted as a flow obstacle, having a significant effect on the velocity profile. Furthermore, in an actual occupied office environment, the thermal plumes and the supply air diffuser mixed effectively the whole air volume. The maximum air velocity measured was still below 0.25 m/s with the extremely high heat gain of 164 W/m². The results demonstrate that analysis methods were the interaction of convection flow and jet are not taken into account could not accurately describe air movement and draught risk in the occupied room space.     

The Influence of Various Air Exchange Rates on Airborne Particles and Microorganisms in Conventionally Ventilated Operating Rooms

Abstract Concentrations of airborne particles and microorganisms were assessed as a function of the air exchange rate in two operating theatres equipped with conventional air ventilation systems. The measurements were made with and without human activity (surgery). Under conditions without human activity the effect of the air exchange rate on viable (=microorganisms) and non-viable airborne particles was measured. Under conditions with human activity an investigation was made to determine whether the air exchange rate has a significant influence on airborne particle and bacteria concentrations. In addition, the influence of the number of persons in the operating theatres and the various operating activities were calculated. Statistical differences were found for airborne particle and airborne bacteria concentrations in supply and room air with and without human activity. From the point of view of hygiene, these differences must be considered irrelevant because of the slight margin (less than one logarithmic step) between the values. A comparison of all air exchange rates clearly shows that the number of personnel present in the operating theatre exerts the strongest influence on airborne particle concentration variance in room air. As regards airborne bacteria concentrations in room air, explanation of variance by the parameters air exchange rate, number of persons and operating activity is negligible. Summarizing the low (7.5 and 10/h) and high (15 and 20/h) air exchange rates did not increase the explanation of variance for airborne particle and bacteria concentrations although the differences were significant.     

Measurements and computations of ventilation efficiency and temperature efficiency in a ventilated room

In order to improve the indoor air quality in a room and to save energy, the air movement and contamination distributions in the room with ventilation have been studied experimentally and numerically. The experiment is carried out in a full-scale climate room with different air supply systems, heat gains from the venetian blinds and ventilation rates. The measurements concern room airflow patterns and air temperature, velocity and contamination concentration fields, etc. The airflow computer program PHOENICS and the cooling load program ACCURACY have been applied for the numerical simulations. PHOENICS solves the conservation equations of air mass, momentum, energy, concentration, kinetic energy and dissipation rate of kinetic energy. ACCURACY, which considers the influence of room air temperature distributions, is employed for the determination of cooling load, wall surface temperatures and convective heat transfer on room enclosure surfaces. These are the boundary conditions required by PHOENICS.The agreements between the computations and the measurements are good. The ventilation efficiency and temperature efficiency which are used for evaluation of indoor air quality and energy consumption are reported for each case. Additional application of these computations to annual energy analysis is also discussed.     

Numerical investigation of local thermal discomfort in offices with displacement ventilation

Local thermal discomfort in offices with displacement ventilation is investigated using computational fluid dynamics. The standard κ-ϵ turbulence model is used for the prediction of indoor air flow patterns, temperature and moisture distributions, taking account of heat transfer by conduction, convection and radiation. The thermal comfort level and draught risk are predicted by incorporating Fanger's comfort equations in the airflow model. It has been found that for sedentary occupants with summer clothing common complaints of discomfort in offices ventilated with displacement systems result more often from an unsatisfactory thermal sensation level than from draught alone. It is shown that thermal discomfort in the displacement-ventilated offices can be avoided by optimizing the supply air velocity and temperature. It is also shown that optimal supply air conditions of a displacement system depend on the distance between the occupant and air diffuser.     

Thermal Comfort in the Near-Zone of a Radiator Air Device

Abstract The near-zone of an air inlet device is the most critical part of a room as regards fulfilment of the thermal conform demands. An acceptable solution for residential buildings can be to supply the outdoor air through an air device placed behind a radiator. Such a device provides a mechanical exhaust system that supplies pre-heated outdoor air. Normally radiator air devices are located below a window and a window-sill. To examine the influence of a window-sill placed above an air device, several different positions and breadths of sills were tested. Air velocities and air temperatures were measured at distances within 0.50 m from the device. The measurements show that thermal comfort is strongly dependent on the location of the window-sill in relation to the air device. The degree of turbulence intensity affects the percentage of dissatisfied people due to draught. The velocity measurement system used in this study allows variation of the time constant of the system. When different time constants were used, the measured turbulence intensity varied considerably. Some measurements were carried out with the radiator switched off. In these cases different air velocities were measured, depending on the orientation of the sensors. This seems to be due to the temperature and velocity gradients at the measuring points.     

复合空调室内气态污染物对流输运模拟

利用CFD数值模拟方法分析了复合窗式空调系统对建筑室内气态污染物输运过程的影响.采用雷诺应力模型(RSM)描述了室内空气和污染物对流输运过程,并详细探讨了复合窗式空调系统的送风速度、新风比、净化效率和室内热源强度等对室内气态污染物对流输运过程的影响.计算结果表明,提高送风速度、新风比以及净化效率都能有效降低室内气态污染物平均浓度.值得注意的是,当送风速度超过0.75 m/s后,室内气态污染物浓度水平维持恒定;空调系统即使按全新风模式运行,也不能彻底排除室内污染物.     

The Influence of Office Furniture,Workstation Layouts,Diffuser Types and Location on Indoor Air Quality and Thermal Comfort Conditions at Workstations

Abstract Many factors affect the airflow patterns, contaminant removal efficiency and the indoor air quality at individual workstations in office buildings. The effects of office furniture design and workstation layouts on ventilation performance, contaminant removal efficiency and thermal comfort conditions at workstations were studied. The range of furniture configurations and environmental parameters investigated included: 1) partition heights, 2) partition gap size, 3) diffuser types, 4) supply air diffuser location relative to the workstation, 5) return air grill location relative to the workstation, 6) heat source locations, 7) presence of furniture, 8) supply air temperatures, 9) adjacent workstations, 10) contaminant source locations, 11) supply air flow rates, and 12) outdoor air flow rates. The tracer gas technique was used to study experimentally the relative impact of these parameters on the air distribution and ventilation performance, as well as contaminant removal efficiency. Thermal environmental parameters such as air velocity and temperature were monitored at several locations to characterize the impact of these parameters on the thermal comfort conditions. The results showed that the outdoor air flow rate had a significant influence on the mean age of air. The air distributions at all the workstations were good even when the supply air flow rate was relatively low (i.e 5 L/s). At the same time, most of the parameters tested had a significant influence on contaminant removal efficiency when there was a contaminant source present somewhere in the office.     

Modelling of the Indoor Environment – Particle Dispersion and Deposition

Abstract A three-dimensional drift-flux model for particle movements in turbulent airflows in buildings is presented. The interaction between the carrier air and the particles has been treated as a one-way coupling, assuming the effect of particles on air turbulence is negligible due to low solid loadings and comparatively small particle settling velocities. Turbulence effects are modelled with a standard κ-? model. Wall functions are applied at near-wall grid points. Aerosol measurements carried out under turbulent room flow conditions are used to validate the numerical calculations. Several particle size distributions are considered in the simulations. The model is then applied to mixed flow conditions in a room, as well as to homogeneous air supply conditions around a human body. The flow fields and particle distributions are analysed. Close to a standing person, the particle distribution pattern from a downstream point source is strongly dependent on the ventilation air supply rate. This has been confirmed by experiments reported in the literature.     

工业厂房自然通风热环境的数值研究

运用CFD技术对某典型工业厂房的自然通风进行了数值模拟。研究了热源、污染源参数一定时,不同进风口离地高度对厂房工作区热环境及污染物浓度分布的影响。分析了带热源工业厂房热环境的主要特点,认为评价这种高温环境时,应同时考虑工作区风速及建筑内壁面辐射的影响。为此,采用热应力指数HIS作为这类热环境的评价指标。结果可以看出,对于热源具有一定的高度的工业厂房,适当提高进风口位置,不仅可以增加自然通风量,提高工作区空气流速,改善工作区热环境,而且有助于降低厂房平均污染物浓度。随着H的增加,通风量和工作区风速增大,热应力指数和污染物浓度减小。当H增加到1.2 m后,通风量和工作区风速基本不再变化。     

Study on biological contaminant control strategies under different ventilation models in hospital operating room

Transmission of airborne bacteria is the main factor causing surgical site infection (SSI). Previous researches have provided evidence of relationships between cleanness of room air and incidence of SSI, but little work has been done to verify the numerical simulation results of particle dispersion. This paper focuses on the airborne transmission of bacteria in two operating rooms during two surgeries: a surgical stitching of fractured mandible and a joint replacement surgery. Field measurement was carried out in two newly built ISO class 5 (OR.A) and class 6 (OR.B) operating rooms. Bacteria collecting agar dishes were put in different places of the two operating rooms to get the deposited bacteria number during the operation. Then numerical simulation was carried out to calculate the particle trajectories using the Euler–Lagrange approach. Simulation results were compared with field measured data, and acceptable level of consistency was found. Then we changed the supply air velocity and supply vent area in the OR.B numerical model under same room air change rate, to compare bacteria colony deposition onto the “critical area”, which consisted of three connected surfaces around the surgical site on patient body. Result showed that improving air flow pattern can reduce particle deposition on critical surface, but its effect is less evident by increasing the air change rate in a certain amount, and we found that bacteria colony deposition would increase (mainly on upper surface), if air velocity increases beyond a certain velocity.     

Particle transport characteristics in indoor environment with an air cleaner: The effect of nonuniform particle distributions

Air cleaners are expected to improve the indoor air quality by removing the gaseous contaminants and fine particles. In our former work, the effects of the air cleaner on removing the uniformly distributed particles were numerically investigated. Based on those results, this work further explores the performances of the air cleaner in the reduction of two nonuniform particle distributions generated by smoking and coughing. The Lagrangian discrete trajectory model combined with the Eulerian fluid method is employed to simulate the airflow pattern and particle transport in a room. In general, the results show that the particle fates have been resulted from the interaction between the emitting source and the air cleaner. And the position of the air cleaner is a key parameter affecting the particle concentration, for which a shorter distance between the air cleaner and the human body corresponds to a lower concentration. Besides, the air velocity emitted from the human mouth and the orientation of the air cleaner can also influence the transport of particles.     

A study of the effect of heat source location in a ventilated room using multiple regression analysis

Multiple regression analysis is a statistical technique which allows to predict a dependent variable from more than one independent variable and also to determine influential independent variables. Using experimental data, in this study the multiple regression analysis is applied to predict the room mean velocity and determine the most influencing parameters on the velocity. More than 120 experiments for four different heat source locations were carried out in a test chamber with a high level wall mounted air supply terminal at air change rates 3–6 ach. The influence of the environmental parameters such as supply air momentum, room heat load, Archimedes number and local temperature ratio, were examined by two methods: a simple regression analysis incorporated into scatter matrix plots and multiple stepwise regression analysis. It is concluded that, when a heat source is located along the jet centre line, the supply momentum mainly influences the room mean velocity regardless of the plume strength. However, when the heat source is located outside the jet region, the local temperature ratio (the inverse of the local heat removal effectiveness) is a major influencing parameter.     

Floor heating and cooling combined with displacement ventilation: Possibilities and limitations

Design guidelines envisage that floor heating can be used together with displacement ventilation (DV), provided that the supply air is not overly heated before it can reach heat and contaminant sources. If this is not controlled a mixing flow pattern could occur in the room. The use of floor cooling with DV is also considered possible, although draught risk at ankle level and vertical air temperature differences must be controlled carefully, because they could increase.Few studies on these topics were found in the literature.An indoor environmental chamber was set up to obtain measurements aimed at analysing the possibilities and limitations of combining floor heating/cooling with DV. Air temperature profiles, air velocity profiles, surface temperatures and ventilation effectiveness were measured under different environmental conditions that may occur in practice. These values were compared to equivalent temperature measurements obtained using a thermal manikin.The measurements show that floor heating can be used with DV, obtaining high ventilation effectiveness values. A correlation between the floor heating capacity and the air temperature profile in the room was found. Measurements showed that floor cooling does not increase draught risk at ankle level, although it does increase vertical air temperature differences.     

Air distribution in room ventilated by fabric air dispersion system

Several researches about airflow distribution in a room generated by fabric air dispersion system (FADS) were reported, but details about the simulation in computer fluid dynamics (CFD) method were not elaborated. In present work The commercial software FLUENT with standard k−ε$k-\epsilon$ turbulence model is applied to predict air distribution in a room ventilated by FADS in penetration mode, where FADS is described with the porous media model based on the modified Forchheimer equation. And more details about the simulation are given. Flow visualization near the region of FADS is conducted using dry-ice as a smoking material. The distribution of indoor air velocity and temperature and draught rating (DR) around the ankle and neck level are predicted. The simulation well matches the corresponding experimental value and results of earlier work. Results showed that air is radially discharged out in the direction perpendicular to the spatial cambered porous fibre in lower velocity, and evenly distributed along its length direction when air is distributed by FADS in penetration mode. The velocity of indoor air is very low, and the vertical air temperature difference is small (less than 2 K). DR around the ankle and neck is immune to supply air flow rate and location, which is less than the comfort limit of ASHRAE Standard 55-2004. In addition, airflow pattern is greatly impacted by the location and strength of heat load.     

Must cold air down draughts be compensated when using highly insulating windows?

Rooms with high windows are likely to have comfort problems caused by cold air down draught, which are usually solved by placing heating appliances underneath the windows. In the city of Zug, Switzerland, a highly insulated educational building with a concrete core system for heating and cooling is planned. The purpose of our investigation was to find out whether any measures are necessary in this building to compensate the effects of down draught in the occupied zone. Special attention has been paid to the effect of passive measures like air flow obstacles or openings in the window sill. Experiments were carried out in a room climate laboratory on 1:1 scale to measure the down draught and the thermal comfort in the occupied zone. Several configurations of window sizes, insulating standards and outside temperatures were investigated. In addition, the results were compared to values obtained from analytical calculations and from literature. The conclusion was that the window frame, not the window pane, is the critical element and that there will be no unacceptable draught risk in the occupied zone, as long as the window frame is also highly insulating. Therefore, no additional measures to compensate the down draught were planned for the building in Zug. Furthermore, it was found that the down draught is not only dependent on the window temperature but also on the heat load in the room, i.e. a heat load increases the boundary layer thickness and decreases its peak velocity.     

Concentration Distribution in the Centre Plane of a Ventilated Room Under Isothermal Conditions

This paper presents a series of fill-scale measurements of the concentration distribution in the centre plane of a room with isothermaI mixing ventilation. Vertical projiles of the concentration in the middle of the room have been measured under different conditions. With the contamination source in the middle of the room the vertical profiles were changed radically with an increase of the air change rate from n = 1.5h^?1 to n = 6h^?1 due to a change in the flow structure in the room. With a constant air change rate, the location of the contamination source in the room showed a great influence on the vertical profile. A high velocity around the contamination source resulted in a uniform contaminant distribution in the room, while a low velocity resulted in considerable differences. Contours of concentration in the centre plane of the room have been measured using different contaminant densities. The densities were low, neutral and high in relation to the density of air. The results showed that the contaminant distribution in the room with the chosen flow conditions depended strongly on the contaminant density, and that the high density case gave the highest concentrations in the occupied zone.