LoginNotes importance of air infiltration for total energy budget of a structure and indoor-outdoor pollution. Treats briefly significant energy savings which can be achieved by reducing infiltration rates in buildings.
Bibliographic database Airbase
AIRBASE is the Bibliographic Database of the AIVC. It contains publications and abstracts of articles related to energy efficient ventilation. Where possible, sufficient detail is supplied in the bibliographic details for users to trace and order the material via their own libraries. Topics include: ventilation strategies, design and retrofit methods, calculation techniques, standards and regulations, measurement methods, indoor air quality and energy implications etc. Entries are based on articles and reports published in journals, internal publications and research reports, produced both by university departments and by building research institutions throughout the world. AIRBASE has grown and evolved over many years (1979 to present day, over 22000 references and 16000 documents available online). For most of the references, the full document is also available online.
Access to the publications is free of charge.
Discusses oxygen requirements and moisture emission of individuals and generation of CO2, odours, and aerosols in inhabited rooms. Treats calculation of hygienically necessary air flow rates.
Provides results of measurements of air infiltration and natural air movement in 3 high rise buildings (flats, university, offices).
Treats 4 mechanisms of building heat exchange with the environment and their effect on overall energy consumption: 1) air infiltration and exfiltration, pressure distributions and gradients and resulting mass transfer at building surfaces; 2) infl
Outlines necessary ventilation rates for an occupied room. Discusses natural ventilation of a room through openings in the ceiling.
Reconsiders semi-empirical equations derived from earlier laboratory investigation of flow through cracks. Proposes revised method of application. States equations offer improved technique for estimating open areas of room components.
Claims procedures for design of ventilation and air flow systems are energy wasteful. Cause lies in their methods and technical bases and influence of other factors entering into final systems choice (particularly economics).
Conducts series of tunnel tests to examine ways in which wind influence air infiltration energy losses in housing.
Points out that ventilation heat loss can account for 50% of total loss in a well-ventilated house. Presents analysis of mechanics of natural ventilation.
Reviews the main mechanisms giving rise to natural ventilation of spaces with openings to outside air on one wall only. These are temperature difference, pressure fluctuation, mean pressure difference, turbulent diffusion and the "vane" effect.
Describes experiments emitting a gaseous tracer (methane) into a ventilated test room and measuring gas concentration with rapid-response hydrocarbon analyser. Parameters were contaminant source location, sample location and ventilation rate.
Gives general account of Twin Rivers project summarising main findings from 1972 to date. Includes section on air infiltration. Measurements of infiltration rates were taken using tracer gas method and regression equation found for the data.
Describes how ventilation rates in two houses with recirculating air distribution systems were monitored by injecting CO2 tracer gas into the supply and measuring its concentration in the return air.
Describes the determination of infiltration rates for houses in Seneffe. Gives infiltration rates for individual rooms, found using O2 as tracer gas, and recording wind speed and direction.
Developes mathematical model of air infiltration based on crack flow equations. Describes measurements made on test house. Shows that actual pressure distributions in walls deviate considerably from values in guidebooks.
Describes measurements made to compare ventilation rates in six Belgian houses with both natural and mechanical ventilation systems using O2 and N2O as tracer gases. Ventilation rates were correlated with wind speed.
Reports measurements made in a flat in the Netherlands of internal to external temperature and pressure differences, wind speed and direction, position of windows and doors -whether opened or closed- and ventilation rates.
Reports study of the potential for energy saving in an old low-rise, 50 unit apartment building. Energy use and heat balance of the building are calculated including heat loss through conduction and air infiltration.
Studies effect of joints between building components on air tightness of buildings, and the factors which influence the air leakage through a joint.