What we know about smart ventilation

The buildings ‘sector is facing multiple challenges due to the need to generalize a sober approach and to reduce its energy consumption, its CO2 emissions and its impact on climate change, to reduce its environmental impact and its carbon footprint, to reduce the burden of disease due to exposure to unhealthy indoor environments and to adapt and be resilient in the face of climate change and environmental changes such as the increase in pandemics, the urban heat island and outdoor pollution.
Ventilation in buildings is at the heart of all these challenges and is sometimes misunderstood, contrasting the need to reduce air flow to save energy with the need to increase air flow to provide healthy air for humans. We know that reality is never simple, as it is in this field. Building ventilation represents an incredible and underestimated factor in reconciling all these challenges, part of the solution. Firstly, because to achieve all these objectives, including IAQ, summer comfort and energy savings from heating and air conditioning, you really have to control the air flows in buildings. This means limiting unintentional infiltration due to air leaks and controlling voluntary air flows using ventilation system components. Secondly, through the concept of smart ventilation, which can be a solution for both new and existing buildings.
Indeed, providing a constant ventilation airflow rate throughout a building, whatever the boundary conditions (climate, outdoor pollution, seasons, …), whatever the needs of the occupants, whatever the risks of damage to the buildings, seems totally unsuited to our challenging changing world and our need to adapt. Nevertheless, most buildings in developed countries are equipped with constant-airflow ventilation solutions, where ventilation exists.