English

This study aims to use the WELL Building Standard (v2), an internationally recognised rating system for health & wellbeing in buildings, to perform a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the effect of wellbeing measures on an office building’s energy use in three different climates. The qualitative analysis was based on literature review and engineering rules of thumb to assess the potential energy impact of WELL’s 120 features.

Indoor environmental quality in educational buildings is recognized as a crucial aspect for the achievement of the learning outcomes for students. Nevertheless, indoor school conditions are often found unsatisfactory in several European countries, including Italy, especially as regards indoor air quality IAQ. For instance, taking CO2 concentration as IAQ indicator, the threshold of 1000 ppm is often overcome, suggesting insufficient ventilation rates.

The primary purpose of ventilation and air-conditioning system is to ensure internal comfort conditions through a continuous supply of air and maintaining the assumed indoor parameters. High air velocity in the occupied zone may result in an uncomfortable feeling of the draft, cooling effect, or local discomfort. The subjects of the study are linear diffusers, which depending on the purpose, are installed in ceilings, floors, or walls. Models may vary widely in their shape, number or size of slots/nozzles, and the length or shape of the deflector blades.

Nowadays people spend an average of 87% of their time inside buildings. Schools are a particularly delicate type of buildings for several reasons. Firstly, their primary occupants such as children, boys and girls are more vulnerable than adults, and spend a large portion of their time in schools. Secondly, pupils, but also teachers and other school personnel have often little or no control on the indoor environmental quality (IEQ). Thirdly, school buildings are usually either old and cannot ensure an adequate IEQ (e.g.

Urbanization has led to systemic environmental factors that degrade air quality and microbial diversity, negatively impacting human health and wellbeing. Conventional building Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) units that filter airborne pollutants and support Indoor Air Quality (IAQ), are often energy intensive, decrease indoor microbial diversity, and are still unable to address specific pollutants or seasonal psychrometric profiles.

The present study investigates acoustic comfort in naturally ventilated residential buildings through an indoor soundscape approach. Preliminary results from a laboratory listening test are presented, where, in a mock-up living room with a window sight, participants have been exposed to 20 acoustic scenarios, obtained as a combination of 4 indoor sound sources and 5 outdoor urban environments filtered through a window ajar. Participants were asked to rate each exposure condition.

The steady-state concentration of occupant generated carbon dioxide (CO2) is used in some applications as an indicator of compliance with a required ventilation rate. These applications assume that the CO2 is at a uniform concentration in the space being considered, and that the outdoor concentration, ventilation rate, and CO2 emission rate are all constant. Emission rates are often derived using an equation in the ASHRAE Fundamentals Handbook, which is poorly referenced and not based on the most recent understanding of the principles of human metabolism.

This study aims at obtaining feedback from occupants of low-energy retrofitted houses concerning the indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and the building systems in their homes. A questionnaire study was carried out in a social housing complex consisting of 2007 single-family houses, of which 1305 were retrofitted between 2014 and 2019. The different retrofitted houses were equipped with two types of heating systems, as well as balanced mechanical ventilation with two inlet locations.

The sudden global outbreak of coronavirus diseases 2019 (COVID-19) has infected over seventy million people and resulted in over one million deaths by the end of 2020, posing a significant threat to human health. As potential carries of the novel coronavirus, exhaled airflow of infected individuals via coughs, are significant in virus transmission. This study measures human coughs' airflow velocity in a chamber filled with stage fog employing a particle image velocimetry (PIV) system.

A longitudinal study was conducted to establish metrics on perception, concentration and characterization of indoor air quality (IAQ) at a university library building. A questionnaire was applied to library staff in 2016 and 2017 to measure perceived indoor air quality (PIAQ) and perceived respiratory health impacts (PRHI). Measurements of PM2.5-10 and PM2.5 concentration levels were made in 2017 and 2019, respectively.