The heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning (HVAC) system for a laboratory must be designed with consideration for safety, air cleanliness, and space temperature. The primary safety concern is to ensure proper coordination between fume hood exhaust and makeup air supply. Air cleanliness is maintained by properly filtering supply air, by delivering adequate room air changes, and by ensuring proper pressure relationships between the laboratory and adjacent spaces. Space temperature is maintained by supplying enough cooling air to offset the amount of heat generated in the room.
Containment of hazards in a laboratory chemical hood is based on the principle that air drawn through the face area of the hood is sufficient to overcome the many challenges at or near the opening. Challenges to overcome include, but are not limited to, air velocities near the hood, movement of the researcher, people walking past the hood, location of equipment inside the hood, size of the sash opening, and the shape and configuration of entrance conditions. To overcome these challenges, a sufficient face velocity must be maintained.
This paper addresses atria smoke management systems where it is intended that occupants will be in contact with smoke. While this approach is unusual, it is recognized by several authoritative publications on atrium smoke management. A tenability analysis for an atrium smoke management system needs to account for the effects of ( 1) exposure to toxic gases, (2) exposure to elevated temperatures, and (3) smoke obscuration. Much of this paper consists of adapting and presenting well-established tenability methods for application to smoke management.
This paper discusses the numerical study of the effectiveness of atrium smoke exhaust systems. This study is part of a project initiated by A SH RAE and the National Research Council of Canada (NRCC), in which both physical and numerical techniques were employed to determine the effectiveness of such systems and to develop guidelines for their design. This paper presents numerical predictions obtained using a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model and compares the numerical results with the experimental data obtained from tests performed in this project.
This paper presents results of a project initiated by ASHRAE and the National Research Council of Canada. The project applies both physical and numerical modeling to atrium smoke exhaust systems to investigate the effectiveness of such systems and to develop guidelines for their design. In this paper, results were obtained from a series of tests conducted using a large-scale physical model.
The primary purpose of a laboratory exhaust system is to remove and convey fumes from the fume hoods and laboratory spaces to an area for safe discharge. This requires discharge conditions that allow good dispersion and prevent re-entrainment. Since laboratories are usually designed for once through air ( 100% makeup air with no recirculation), a secondary purpose is energy recovery from the exhaust stream. Laboratory exhaust systems have typically one of two arrangements.
This paper describes the wind tunnel study conducted on behalf of the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) to evaluate and quantify the effect of architectural screens on rooftop concentration levels due to effluent from short stacks. An equivalent stack height (ESH) concept is introduced, which is used to develop a stack height reduction (SHR) factor that may be used in conjunction with existing stack design procedures found in the 1997 ASHRAE Handbook-Fundamentals to account for the presence of architectural screens.
Laboratory exhaust stacks should be designed with sufficient height and exit momentum to avoid re-entry of exhaust and possible air quality problems, and the design should be evaluated before construction. One evaluation method is presented in this paper that combines dilution prediction equations from the 1997 ASHRAE Handbook-Fundamentals (1997} and a dilution criteria of Halitsky (1988). This method is less conservative than a geometric method in the ASHRAE Handbook and is less costly than wind-tunnel modeling.