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Thermal Comfort and Air Quality in Rooms Equipped with Personalized...
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Thermal Comfort and Air Quality in Rooms Equipped with Personalized Ventilation Systems

A special issue of Buildings (ISSN 2075-5309). This special issue belongs to the section "Building Energy, Physics, Environment, and Systems".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (29 February 2024) | Viewed by 6491

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Hayder Alsaad

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Building Physics, Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, 99423 Weimar, Germany
Interests: thermal comfort; indoor air quality; human exposure assessment; ventilation systems; computational fluid dynamics
Dr. Douaa Al-Assaad

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Faculty of Engineering Technology, Department of Civil Engineering, KU Leuven, 40, 3001 Leuven, Belgium
Interests: resilience; personalized comfort and ventilation systems; thermal comfort; air quality; sustainability

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

We are pleased to introduce a Special Issue in the journal Buildings dedicated to the exploration of personalized ventilation systems in indoor spaces. These advanced air distribution systems offer an innovative solution to enhance indoor air quality and occupant comfort. Unlike traditional HVAC systems, personalized ventilation systems are occupant-centric systems that provide individualized airflow directly towards occupants’ breathing zones, tailoring conditions to suit their preferences and needs. Occupants gain greater control over their immediate environment, allowing them to adjust airflow rates, temperature, and air quality parameters to optimize their comfort and well-being.

Energy efficiency and resilience against extreme events (e.g., climate change) are other significant benefits of personalized ventilation systems. By selectively delivering conditioned air to occupied zones, these systems minimize energy waste compared to traditional centralized HVAC systems by allowing the macroclimate temperature and air quality conditions to drift outside conventional ranges. Moreover, with the smaller size of these local systems and the possibility of downsizing background HVAC systems, personalized ventilators have a potentially low carbon footprint.

This Special Issue aims to gather ground-breaking and novel research highlighting the numerous advantages of personalized ventilation systems in indoor spaces. We invite researchers and experts in the field to contribute their insights and findings to this Special Issue. Together, we can advance the understanding and implementation of personalized ventilation systems in various indoor environments, including homes, offices, schools, and healthcare facilities.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Hayder Alsaad
Dr. Douaa Al-Assaad
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Buildings is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • personalized ventilation systems
  • built environment
  • advanced air distribution systems
  • user controlled
  • human centric
  • micro-climatization
  • local thermal comfort

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

23 pages, 3031 KiB  
Article
Analysis of Volatile Organic Compound Emissions in 3D Printing: Implications for Indoor Air Quality
by Hector Garcia-Gonzalez, Teresa Lopez-Pola, Pilar Fernandez-Rubio and Pablo Fernandez-Rodriguez
Buildings 2024, 14(11), 3343; https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings14113343 - 22 Oct 2024
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 3878
Abstract
This study provides a comprehensive analysis of volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions in the context of 3D printing, a rapidly advancing technology that is transforming manufacturing processes. As the adoption of 3D printing grows, concerns regarding its potential impact on indoor air quality [...] Read more.
This study provides a comprehensive analysis of volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions in the context of 3D printing, a rapidly advancing technology that is transforming manufacturing processes. As the adoption of 3D printing grows, concerns regarding its potential impact on indoor air quality have emerged. This research addresses these concerns by investigating the risks associated with VOC emissions and proposing effective mitigation strategies. Using a robust methodology, filament and resin-based 3D printers were employed alongside VOC sampling equipment (Tenax tubes and personal pumps) to assess emissions. A detailed analysis of 49 VOCs revealed variable concentrations across different printing materials, with ethyl acetate being the dominant compound in resin printing and decanal in filament printing. While individual VOC levels were below 1% of occupational exposure limits, total VOC concentrations frequently exceeded the recommended indoor threshold of 200 µg/m3, particularly in resin-based processes. This raises concerns about the combined effects of multiple VOCs, some of which are known carcinogens. These findings underscore the need for further investigation into the cumulative health impacts of prolonged exposure to multiple VOCs. The study also emphasises the importance of accounting for both facility-specific conditions and material emissions to fully understand the environmental and health consequences of 3D printing. Preventative measures, such as enclosing 3D printers and equipping them with extraction systems, are recommended to safeguard user health. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Thermal Comfort and Air Quality in Rooms Equipped with Personalized Ventilation Systems)
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26 pages, 3459 KiB  
Article
Resilience of Personalized Ventilation in Maintaining Acceptable Breathable Air Quality When Combined with Mixing Ventilation Subject to External Shocks
by Jennifer Karam, Kamel Ghali and Nesreen Ghaddar
Buildings 2024, 14(3), 654; https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings14030654 - 1 Mar 2024
Viewed by 1775
Abstract
This work evaluates the ventilation resilience of the combined personalized ventilation (PV)-mixing ventilation (MV) system when implemented in a typical office space. This resilience is first evaluated by monitoring the ability of the PV devices when designed at different supply flow rates to [...] Read more.
This work evaluates the ventilation resilience of the combined personalized ventilation (PV)-mixing ventilation (MV) system when implemented in a typical office space. This resilience is first evaluated by monitoring the ability of the PV devices when designed at different supply flow rates to maintain acceptable levels of CO2 at the occupant’s breathing zone when the MV system is subjected to a shock. The shock considers a malfunction of the MV system for periods of 3 h and 6 h, and at shutoff percentages of MV fan flow of 100% and 50%. This is followed by evaluating the resilience of the MV system when the PV air handling unit is shutoff for short periods. The following three aspects of resilience were calculated: the absorptivity, the recovery, and the resilience effectiveness. To monitor the CO2 temporal variation at the breathing zone, a computational fluid dynamic model was developed and validated experimentally. It was found that the resilience effectiveness varied between 0.61 (100% MV shutoff for 6 h and PV at 4 L/s) and 1 (50% MV shutoff for 3 h and PV at 13 L/s). Additionally, CO2 build-up and recovery took minutes during MV malfunctions and seconds during PV malfunctions. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Thermal Comfort and Air Quality in Rooms Equipped with Personalized Ventilation Systems)
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