Dan Diehl from Remi Network shared an article that explains how to provide healthy environments and, at the same time, meet climate goals. With the new variants of COVID 19, such as Delta, tenants and occupants have begun to worry again.
Building owners and occupants need to prioritize healthy indoor air quality, especially ventilation systems. “At the same time, the U.S. and other leading industrial countries are setting aggressive carbon-reduction goals that push building owners to cut back on energy-intensive systems such as ventilation”. This leads us to a conflictive situation because in order to improve the performance of systems that provide enough fresh air to ensure healthier indoor environments, inevitably the reduction of energy use on the path to carbon neutrality might be jeopardized.
Both goals can be achieved by using ‘the right technologies’. Let’s review what this article proposes as possible solutions to make “dramatic improvements on both fronts in all commercial buildings”:
Accurate measurement
In order to create healthy and sustainable spaces it is very important to have an accurate measurement system of factors such as air quality. One of the solutions proposed is to “shift from a fixed, predetermined air change rate to a dynamically controlled air change rate based on conditions in the space”. In order to apply this technique, it is required to have accurate and relable air quality measurement. “That was achieved with an innovative system architecture that allows a single set of industrial quality sensors to measure the air quality in multiple lab spaces at a low life cycle cost”.
Effective ventilation
Effective ventilation can be achieved by controlling the amount of healthy air based on accurate measurement. “In fact, the highly flexible DCV (Demand Control of Ventilation) approach can provide the right amount of healthy air where and when needed. It allows for lower ventilation rates when the air is clean, as well as meeting science-based standards”.
The parameters that can help measure healthof indoor environements can be determined by five parameters: small particles, carbon monoxide and dioxide, relative humidity, and total volatile organic gases. DCV helps maintain optimal levels for each in the most efficient, sustainable manner.
“These lessons learned from critical environments can be applied to other types of buildings, including classrooms and commercial offices. In addition, the emerging consensus is to use higher ventilation rates in all buildings. This certainly means that, left unchanged or unmanaged, there is a huge potential to significantly over-ventilate — wasting money and needlessly impairing sustainability goals. The future of healthy and sustainable buildings depends on optimizing — even improving — both of these seemingly conflicting requirements”.
MKThink is working with sensors in all of its projects to have good information to drive decision-making. Learn more by contacting us. Or to read more about today's article, click here: https://www.reminetwork.com/articles/provide-healthy-environments-meet-climate-goals/