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Residential buildings in South Korea have equipped an energy recovery ventilation (ERV) system to improve energy efficiency as well as dilute indoor air pollution. While most studies have focused on the efficiency of energy exchange or the ventilation performance of the ERV itself, the ventilation performance can be improved by the proper location of inlet and outlet vents. For the present study, the ventilation performance of the inlet and outlet vents of the ERV was investigated by using CFD simulation. By varying the locations of inlet and outlet vents, the airflow distributions and the age of air were assessed. In addition, the air exchange effectiveness was analyzed by using the mean age of air quantitatively. As a result, a higher age of air was observed when inlet vents were moved to the center of the plan along the wall and an additional inlet or outlet vent was installed in the kitchen. In addition, the highest air exchange effectiveness was obtained when the inlet vents were located in the center of the plan along the wall. Considering the economic perspective, it is recommended to locate the inlet vents in the center to at least improve the ventilation performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human health is significantly impacted by the quality of the air in living areas. Numerous factors, such as the kind of particle, clean air delivery rate, room geometry, surface features, and thermal plume produced by people or other equipment, all have an impact on indoor particle movement. This work uses computational fluid dynamics to quantitatively examine the performance of a portable air purifier that is routinely used to improve the indoor air quality of a room. The volumetric flow rate, particle diameter, and placement of the air cleaner device were considered in the assessment of the particle transport characteristics. The temperature, velocity, and age of the air distribution in the room were computed in three-dimensional simulations, and the effectiveness of the air cleaning device (ACD) in eliminating contaminants was then investigated. Clean air delivery rate (CADR), collection efficiency, and particle concentration rate values were also computed for every case that was taken into consideration. It is found that CADR and collection efficiency values for larger particles are about 2–7% better than those for smaller particles. The collection efficiency of ACD with different operating conditions is in the range of 71% to 87%. Better collection performance parameters are observed with higher flow rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The worldwide spread of COVID-19 viruses induced many people to pay attention to indoor air quality. In this study, multiple air cleaners were installed in a four-bed ward equipped with a ventilation system to enhance indoor air quality by finding optimal air cleaner operation combinations. The age of air was used as an index to assess indoor air quality. The age of air distribution in the room was obtained through particle number concentration measurement experiment and flow simulation. The cases of operating multiple air cleaners were considered depending on whether the ventilation system and curtains were used. When two air cleaners were operated, their effects were identified by varying their positions. When only two air cleaners were used, the local age of air significantly varied by 18.3 % at maximum depending on the combination of operating positions. When all four air cleaners were operated, the age of air was lowered by 51.1 % at maximum compared to the cases of operating two air cleaners, regardless of operating the ventilation system and using the curtains. The results of this study are expected to be used for determining the optimal operating positions to improve indoor air quality when using multiple air cleaners in various indoor spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Residential buildings in South Korea have equipped an energy recovery ventilation (ERV) system to improve energy efficiency as well as dilute indoor air pollution. While most studies have focused on the efficiency of energy exchange or the ventilation performance of the ERV itself, the ventilation performance can be improved by the proper location of inlet and outlet vents. For the present study, the ventilation performance of the inlet and outlet vents of the ERV was investigated by using CFD simulation. By varying the locations of inlet and outlet vents, the airflow distributions and the age of air were assessed. In addition, the air exchange effectiveness was analyzed by using the mean age of air quantitatively. As a result, a higher age of air was observed when inlet vents were moved to the center of the plan along the wall and an additional inlet or outlet vent was installed in the kitchen. In addition, the highest air exchange effectiveness was obtained when the inlet vents were located in the center of the plan along the wall. Considering the economic perspective, it is recommended to locate the inlet vents in the center to at least improve the ventilation performance.

In indoor spaces without mechanical ventilation systems, a common approach involves using a ceiling-mounted 4-way fan coil unit (4WFCU) to regulate indoor temperature and placing floor-level air purifiers (APs) to remove indoor pollutants. This study introduces a differentiated displacement ventilation system (DVS) that connects multiple APs to the 4WFCU using ductwork. The age of air was compared between the case where the newly designed DVS was implemented and the reference case where 4WFCU and APs operated independently. When there were no obstacles in the office central area, the reference system exhibited a lower age of air. Conversely, when obstacles such as desks and partitions were present in the central area, the proposed DVS was found to improve indoor air quality. The DVS resulted in minimal interference among pathlines of the air discharged from multiple floor-level APs and their efficient suction through the ceiling-mounted 4WFCU and diffusers, significantly reducing stagnant air zones, while pathlines of the air discharged from the 4WFCU and APs interfered significantly when they operated independently, leading to larger stagnant areas in the air distribution. Therefore, modifying office spaces with ceiling-mounted 4WFCUs using the proposed DVS is anticipated to substantially enhance indoor air quality through a straightforward installation process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel displacement ventilation system (DVS) was designed using a four-way cassette fan coil unit (FCU) and air purifiers (APs) for supplying clean air. The proposed DVS in this study involved drawing indoor air through the FCU and diffusers installed in the ceiling, controlling air temperature using the FCU, and then discharging it back into the office through the APs placed on the floor. The comparative ventilation system considered was the typical mixing ventilation system (MVS) that intakes and exhausts indoor air using diffusers installed on the ceiling. The local mean age of air was used as an index to compare indoor air quality between DVS and MVS under winter heating conditions. It was found that the DVS was more effective in improving indoor air quality in winter than the MVS. Moreover, compared to the MVS, utilizing the DVS designed in this study resulted in the advantage of a much more uniform air temperature variation in the office space. Therefore, it is anticipated that modifying the structure of an indoor space with an FCU installed in the ceiling and APs on the floor to use the DVS designed in this study would greatly assist in enhancing indoor air quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human health is significantly impacted by the quality of the air in living areas. Numerous factors, such as the kind of particle, clean air delivery rate, room geometry, surface features, and thermal plume produced by people or other equipment, all have an impact on indoor particle movement. This work uses computational fluid dynamics to quantitatively examine the performance of a portable air purifier that is routinely used to improve the indoor air quality of a room. The volumetric flow rate, particle diameter, and placement of the air cleaner device were considered in the assessment of the particle transport characteristics. The temperature, velocity, and age of the air distribution in the room were computed in three-dimensional simulations, and the effectiveness of the air cleaning device (ACD) in eliminating contaminants was then investigated. Clean air delivery rate (CADR), collection efficiency, and particle concentration rate values were also computed for every case that was taken into consideration. It is found that CADR and collection efficiency values for larger particles are about 2–7% better than those for smaller particles. The collection efficiency of ACD with different operating conditions is in the range of 71% to 87%. Better collection performance parameters are observed with higher flow rates.

Following the recent pandemic of COVID-19, scientists have made many efforts to devise a workable solution for it, worldwide. However, it was shown that the protective effect of a well-conditioning system is as high as five times in comparison to the face-covering and other proposed procedures. In this context, the age of air and the type of filtration systems in closed spaces became the critical criteria for comparing the capability of ventilation systems. In this paper, a validated numerical model for the perforated duct diffusers is used to study the behaviour of the local age of air at the full-scale office with 8 feet (2.44 [m]) height, under various initial conditions like initial velocity and air change per hour. Also, different geometries for the ducts have been investigated under the same initial condition, as well as the effect of direction, ventilation effectiveness, and flow pattern. Finally, the volume average of the age of air at different zones has been nominated to perform the sensitivity analysis of each variable based on the variation of the airflow. The results show that diffusers with vertical perforations would be more effective during the pandemic than the other types in airborne mitigation. Moreover, the highest available airflow shall be set until such time there is no windy area in the breathing zone. Within these modifications, the residence time of the infectious nuclei in the breathing zone may decrease by up to 30%.

Poor indoor air quality in residential buildings always threatens human health, such as sick building syndrome (SBS), respiratory diseases and low sleep quality. Although fresh air can dilute the concentration of air pollution, the widely used natural ventilation is uncontrolled and its ventilation rate is usually insufficient. Even in the indoor environments of residential buildings where the mechanical ventilation system is installed, different forms of ventilation systems have their unique problems. To create a healthy indoor environment, this investigation proposed a novel push-relay-pull mechanical ventilation system (fresh air supplying system) achieved by combining the mechanical air supply system (push), intermediate relay system (relay) and mechanical exhaust system (pull). This investigation further quantitatively evaluated the performance of the proposed system by comparing it with the traditional mechanical fresh air ventilation system using the age of air, infection risk and carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration indexes. The proposed system only needs to install one set of ducts as the traditional mechanical ventilation systems. It can ensure that all rooms would maintain good air quality, and also prevent the spread of pollutants, reduce the average infection risk of people inside a residential building and are conducive to epidemic prevention and control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to the global spread of diseases and epidemics, the need to maintain a clean indoor atmosphere has received increasing attention in recent years. Therefore, there will be a need to clearly estimate and define the areas that affect human exposure to pollutants, taking into account the occupied density, which is the primary importance of this research. The capacity of the chilled ceiling combined with mixing ventilation and personal ventilation systems has been studied and compared to the chilled ceiling with mixing ventilation in terms of mean air age, temperature distribution, CO2 concentration, and thermal efficiency, with the best flow rate of the proposed system considering the occupied density in a thermally insulated office room experimentally in the climate of Iraq (Hilla, a hot and dry climate). Twelve tests were performed for four different cooling loads with cooled ceilings (0%, 0.25%, 50%, and 80%), at a constant supply air flow rate with two PV airflow modifiers for three cases. As the cooling load treated by a chilled ceiling increased, the average air temperature increased with height in all cases. The lowest values of average air age appeared in the occupied area in the case of a chilled ceiling with mixing ventilation. This study shows that the chilled ceiling combined with a mixing ventilation and personal ventilation system with a flow rate of 7.5 L/s provides thermal comfort and higher air quality in the occupied area. based on the values of air exchange efficiency and occupants' air exchange efficiency. As a result, a flow rate of 7.5 L/s is the best option for protecting occupants from direct pollution in the breathing zone and in the surrounding microclimate, because the lower the ventilation rate, the less air is changed for occupants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Particulate matter in Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machining workshop is harmful to workers' health. This paper studies particulate matter transfer and the performance of various ventilation strategies in a CNC machining workshop. To obtain the boundary condition of the particle field, instruments were installed to obtain the particle size attenuation characteristics and source strength, respectively. The results show that the 99% cumulative mass concentration of particles is distributed within 1.5 μm, and the release rate of particles from the full enclosure. Next, the indoor flow field and particle field were simulated by numerical simulation with the measured boundary conditions. The working area's age of air, particle concentration, and ventilation efficiency were compared between four displacement ventilation methods and one mixed ventilation method. The results show that the working area's mean particle concentration and ventilation efficiency under longitudinal displacement ventilation is better than other methods. At the same time, the mean age of air is slightly worse. In addition, mixed ventilation can obtain lower mean age of air, but the particle concentration is higher in the working area. The bilateral longitudinal ventilation can be improved by placing axial circulation fans with vertical upward outlets in the center of the workshop. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel displacement ventilation system (DVS) was designed using a four-way cassette fan coil unit (FCU) and air purifiers (APs) for supplying clean air. The proposed DVS in this study involved drawing indoor air through the FCU and diffusers installed in the ceiling, controlling air temperature using the FCU, and then discharging it back into the office through the APs placed on the floor. The comparative ventilation system considered was the typical mixing ventilation system (MVS) that intakes and exhausts indoor air using diffusers installed on the ceiling. The local mean age of air was used as an index to compare indoor air quality between DVS and MVS under winter heating conditions. It was found that the DVS was more effective in improving indoor air quality in winter than the MVS. Moreover, compared to the MVS, utilizing the DVS designed in this study resulted in the advantage of a much more uniform air temperature variation in the office space. Therefore, it is anticipated that modifying the structure of an indoor space with an FCU installed in the ceiling and APs on the floor to use the DVS designed in this study would greatly assist in enhancing indoor air quality.

Wave‐induced adiabatic mixing in the winter midlatitudes is one of the key processes impacting stratospheric transport. Understanding its strength and structure is vital to understanding the distribution of trace gases and their modulation under a changing climate. Age‐of‐air is often used to understand stratospheric transport, and this study proposes refinements to the vertical age gradient theory of Linz et al. (2021), https://doi.org/10.1029/2021JD035199. The theory assumes exchange of air between a well‐mixed tropics and a well‐mixed extratropics, separated by a transport barrier, quantifying the adiabatic mixing flux across the interface using age‐based measures. These assumptions are re‐evaluated and a refined framework that includes the effects of meridional tracer gradients is established to quantify the mixing flux. This is achieved, in part, by computing a circulation streamfunction in age‐potential temperature coordinates to generate a complete distribution of parcel ages being mixed in the midlatitudes. The streamfunction quantifies the "true" age of parcels mixed between the tropics and the extratropics. Applying the revised theory to an idealized and a comprehensive climate model reveals that ignoring the meridional gradients in age leads to an underestimation of the wave‐driven mixing flux. Stronger, and qualitatively similar fluxes are obtained in both models, especially in the lower‐to‐middle stratosphere. While the meridional span of adiabatic mixing in the two models exhibits some differences, they show that the deep tropical pipe, that is, latitudes equatorward of 15° barely mix with older midlatitude air. The novel age‐potential temperature circulation can be used to quantify additional aspects of stratospheric transport. Plain Language Summary: The chemical composition of the stratosphere, that is, the distribution of trace gases like ozone, water vapor, and ozone destroying substances (ODSs), is heavily influenced by the dynamical processes in the region. One such process, quasi‐horizontal mixing, which is driven by planetary waves, rapidly mixes stratospheric trace gases over planetary scales. It is known that the higher the mixing, the longer the trace gases reside in the stratosphere, providing ODS more time to destroy the ozone. However, the properties of this mixing, for instance, its vertical structure, its strength, and how it changes in a changing climate are not fully understood. Past studies have developed a theoretical framework to quantify the mixing strength, that is, how much mass it moves around on average, using simple measures derived from satellite observations of trace gases. This study provides an update to the theoretical framework. The update can lead to a more accurate estimation of the mixing strength. This is done by introducing a new technique called the Γ–θ circulation, which provides a detailed assessment of the mixing, also allowing us to understand its latitudinal variation. The robustness of the revised theory is tested using two climate models with different complexity. Key Points: The isentropic formulation of the leaky pipe stratospheric transport model (Linz et al., 2021, https://doi.org/10.1029/2021JD035199) is used to estimate midlatitude mixing fluxesA new metric, which quantifies the meridional range of air parcels being mixed across transport barriers, is proposed to estimate mixingThe deep tropical stratosphere mixes with the extratropics in the upper stratosphere, but is otherwise remarkably isolated [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ability of the chilled ceiling combined with mixing ventilation and personal ventilation system (CC/MVPV) to provide comfort and protect occupants from negative pollutants in an office room in Iraq City-Hilla climate (hot and dry climate) was studied considering the occupied density. A transient 3D computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model was used to evaluate the mean air life, temperature distribution, carbon dioxide concentration and thermal efficiency with the best flow rate of the proposed system and compared with the mixing ventilation and chilled ceiling (CCMV) by using AIRPAK software. Three tests were conducted for three different cooling load cases treated with (25, 50, and 80%) cooled ceiling with a total cooling load of (14.8, 29.6, 47.4) W/m² of floor area. The chilled ceiling surface temperature ranged between (23, 21.39, 19)°C and the mixing ventilation supply air temperature (19, 21, 23)°C at a constant supply air flow rate (46 L/s) with two PV air flow rate (5 l/s, 7.5 l/s), room air temperature (25°C). It was discovered that by using a (CC/MVPV) system with an air flow rate (7.5 L/sec), the air quality in the breathing area can be improved based on the values of air exchange efficiency (ηa) and air distribution performance index (ADPI), which are (72%, 89.9) respectively, the efficiency of air exchange (ηD) when the visiting person (the person standing) stays in the room for an one hour, one and half hour, two hours by (99%, 96%, 94%), so we notice the longer he stays, the less the air change for the passengers due to the low ventilation rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indoor environmental control has become primordial to minimize inhalation risk of pollutants through the implementation of next-generation ventilation systems. The performance of these ventilation strategies should be evaluated in terms of risk mitigation using a multi-indicator approach to support the realistic outcome of this evaluation. The present study has evaluated five main ventilation strategies (mixing, displacement, underfloor air, impinging jet and stratum ventilation) widely used in current society and four further cases based on occupant position with respect to supply flow. Their performance was assessed through computational fluid dynamics and two interacting virtual manikins with autonomous respiratory functions to calculate age of air, particle dispersion in a room, particles in the local breathing zone, maximum long-term exposure, deposition rate on human tissue and transfer probability. Results showed that well-mixed air in up-supply strategies increase age of air, particle dispersion in the room, transfer probability and deposition in the human body. Down- and mid-supply methods show high local age of air while improving the other indicators but create asymmetric flow in some cases. Overall, displacement ventilation was the optimal solution because it presented the lowest transfer probability although slightly increased age of air. Furthermore, deposited particles were mainly located in the nasal cavity, which might lower adverse health effects. • Large eddy simulation improves accuracy of indoor particle tracking. • Virtual manikins allow exact inhalation dosage through transfer probability. • Displacement ventilation mitigates particle deposition compared to other types. • Particle tract deposition locale affects human body metabolization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A biosafety level (BSL) laboratory is a set of biocontainment preventative measures used to prevent and isolate hazardous biological agents or their accidental release in a laboratory. It is vital to provide a negative-pressurized environment for disease infection control. The experimental equipment layout may affect the personnel's exposure to infection. However, the equipment layout and exhaust air grilles were in a fixed position in this investigated BSL. Due to retrofitting, the layout arrangement of HEPA as supply air is investigated numerically. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulation is conducted to analyze and determine a better design for contamination control. This study proposes three ventilation arrangements as an alternative design, including vertical arrangement, horizontal arrangement, and L-shaped ventilation arrangements (instead of the supply being arranged in a single line). In addition, the airflow distribution, concentration decay, air of age, ventilation, and removal effectiveness are all examined in the study. The numerical simulation results were verified by a field measurement test. The results revealed that the L-shaped ventilation arrangement for supply air diffusers would achieve better ventilation and removal efficiency. The local mean age of air was also identified as the most satisfactory ventilation performance measure, as it shows the level of contaminant control. It also indicated that ventilation could be improved by arranging the supply air layout with less expenditure through CFD-aided simulation in identifying strategies for best practices for the design stage to reduce the running cost at full operation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performance of a ventilation system affects air quality, thermal comfort, and energy consumption in indoor environments. To evaluate the performance of displacement ventilation under various room configurations, steady Reynolds Averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations were used. The CFD model was validated using measurements of a full-scale test room. The age of air concept was used to evaluate the ventilation performance regarding indoor air quality. The PD index was used to control the case studies for draft risk. Twelve cases with different configurations were systematically studied and compared with the reference case. The configurations included plan aspect ratio, exhaust opening position, inlet position and geometry, and internal heat gains. The results showed that the overall ventilation performance of a room is less sensitive to room configurations compared with local ventilation performance around the occupants. However, almost in all cases, the occupants were exposed to better-than-average air quality in most cases. The results also indicated that when internal heat gains are small, displacement ventilation should be used with caution. Practical application: Any HVAC system design is based on assumptions made for ventilation performance. Comprehensive knowledge of the influential factors is critical for an efficient design. Regarding the architecture and interior design, the architects are also involved in the ventilation systems since they have an axial role in decision making for room configuration, including but not limited to room geometry, the position of inlet and outlet air terminals, and heat/pollutant sources. Consequently, the impact of room configuration on ventilation performance is of practical importance in the architecture, engineering, and construction industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since air quality has a great influence on students' health and learning ability, enhancing air quality in classrooms is important. Currently, widely distributed ventilation systems operate by moving airflow horizontally from ventilation inlets and outlets on the ceiling. This method can reduce the average pollution in a space by diluting it through air exchange; however, it is limited regarding homogeneous cleanliness due to air stagnation at some locations. Therefore, in this study, a new ventilation system was devised to improve indoor air quality and spatial homogeneity by installing ventilation inlets on the ceiling and numerous outlets on the floor, creating a vertical airflow in the interior space; this system was then applied to a middle school classroom. Using the age of air as an index, air quality improvement between the existing and newly designed ventilation systems was compared. In the classroom with the existing ventilation system, the age of air was low in the area near the ventilation inlets, while air congestion areas were widely distributed and air age was high near the outlets. Conversely, in the vertical airflow classroom, the average age of air was approximately 15% lower than that with the existing ventilation system, and the deviation of air age for each position in the classroom space was also reduced, showing a uniform air age distribution. Therefore, the vertical airflow ventilation system proposed in this study can be an effective ventilation scheme for enhancing and homogenizing indoor air quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study targeted a four-bed ward with a ventilation system and a four-way cassette fan coil unit (4-way FCU) installed on the ceiling. The indoor air quality under summer and winter conditions was comparatively analyzed. The age of air was calculated by conducting tests and simulations under diverse conditions, assuming that the ventilation system and 4-way FCU were continuously operating. The use of an air cleaner and ward curtain was investigated for its impact on the air quality in the breathing zone of a patient lying on the bed, and effects of the airflow and discharge angle of the 4-way FCU were considered. Because the 4-way FCU was installed in the central part of the ceiling, where indoor air is sucked in and subsequently discharged in four directions, the age of air at each bed was found to vary depending on the airflow and discharge angle of the 4-way FCU. When the airflow and discharge angle of the 4-way FCU was fixed, the age of air at each bed appeared to be lower during winter heating than in summer cooling mode. The age of air was significantly lowered at each bed, depending on the use of the curtain and the air cleaner along with the ventilation system and 4-way FCU, and appropriate seasonal operating conditions were identified to maintain a lower age of air at each bed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of air cleaners indoors has increased with the increase in indoor activities driven by the COVID-19 outbreak. In this study, the indoor air quality was determined at the location of each patient's respirator in a four-bed hospital ward equipped with a ventilation system and curtains, by varying the position of one air cleaner. By operating the air cleaner alone without the ventilation system, it was confirmed that it is better to place the air cleaner close to the center of the ward, regardless of whether curtains are used. It was further identified that the farther away the air cleaner is from the center, the worse the age of air could be, compared to the case of operating it in the center. Moreover, the situation where the ventilation system and air cleaner were operated simultaneously in the hospital ward was considered. It was discovered that operating the air cleaner close to the ventilation inlets in the absence of curtains helps to improve the indoor air quality. Furthermore, it was found that the age of the air is generally low near the location where the air cleaner is operated in the presence of curtains. Selecting an optimal position for the air cleaner can improve the air quality at the location of each bed in a four-bed hospital ward. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the importance of the seasonal migration of the zonally averaged Hadley circulation on interhemispheric transport of trace gases has been recognized, few studies have examined the role of the zonally asymmetric monsoonal circulation. This study investigates the role of monsoon-like zonally asymmetric heating on interhemispheric transport using a dry atmospheric model that is forced by idealized Newtonian relaxation to a prescribed radiative equilibrium temperature. When only the seasonal cycle of zonally symmetric heating is considered, the mean age of air in the Southern Hemisphere since last contact with the Northern Hemisphere midlatitude boundary layer, is much larger than the observations. The introduction of monsoon-like zonally asymmetric heating not only reduces the mean age of tropospheric air to more realistic values, but also produces an upper-tropospheric cross-equatorial transport pathway in boreal summer that resembles the transport pathway simulated in the NASA Global Modeling Initiative (GMI) Chemistry Transport Model driven with MERRA meteorological fields. These results highlight the monsoon-induced eddy circulation plays an important role in the interhemispheric transport of long-lived chemical constituents.

Natural ventilation can contribute to a sustainable and healthy built environment, but the flow can be highly dependent on the ventilation configuration and the outdoor turbulent wind conditions. As a result, quantifying natural ventilation flow rates can be a challenging task. Wind tunnel experiments offer one approach for studying natural ventilation, but measurements are often restricted to a few points or planes in the building, and the data can have limitations due to the intrusive nature of measurement techniques or due to challenges with optical access. Large-eddy simulations (LES) can offer an effective alternative for analyzing natural ventilation flow, since they can provide a precise prediction of turbulent flow at any point in the computational domain and enable accurate estimates of different ventilation measures. The objective of this study is to use a validated LES set-up to investigate the effect of the opening size, opening location and wind direction on the ventilation flow through an isolated building. The effects are quantified in terms of time-averaged and instantaneous ventilation flow rates, age of air, and ventilation efficiency. The LES results indicate that, for this isolated building case, the effect of the wind direction is more pronounced than the effect of the size and position of the ventilation openings. Importantly, when ventilation is primarily driven by turbulent fluctuations, e.g. for the 90° wind direction, an accurate estimation of the ventilation rate requires knowledge of the instantaneous velocity field.

Natural ventilation is gaining popularity in response to an increasing demand for a sustainable and healthy built environment, but the design of a naturally ventilated building can be challenging due to the inherent variability in the operating conditions that determine the natural ventilation flow. Large-eddy simulations (LES) have significant potential as an analysis method for natural ventilation flow, since they can provide an accurate prediction of turbulent flow at any location in the computational domain. However, the simulations can be computationally expensive, and few validation and sensitivity studies with respect to simulation parameters such as grid resolution and boundary conditions have been reported. The objectives of this study are to validate LES of wind-driven cross-ventilation and to quantify the sensitivity of the solution to the grid resolution and the inflow boundary conditions. We perform LES for an isolated building with two openings, using three different grid resolutions and two different inflow conditions with varying turbulence intensities. Predictions of the ventilation rate are compared to a reference wind-tunnel experiment available from literature, and we also quantify the age of air and ventilation efficiency. For the cross-ventilation case modeled in this paper, the prediction of the mean ventilation flow rate is very robust, showing negligible sensitivity to the grid resolution or the inflow characteristics with the maximum error of 1.9 and 1.3% for each sensitivity study. However, a sufficiently fine grid resolution is required to obtain accurate predictions of the detailed flow pattern and the age of air as they show comparably larger errors of 10 and 20% in the grid sensitivity study, and the standard deviation of the instantaneous ventilation rate is affected by the turbulence in the inflow condition with showing 44% difference.

The circulation of the stratosphere transports important trace gases, including ozone, and can be thought of as having a fast horizontal mixing component and a slow meridional overturning component. Measuring the strength of the circulation directly is not possible, and so it must be inferred from tracer measurements. Long‐lived trace gases can be related to the idealized tracer age of air, which describes how long an air parcel has been in the stratosphere. In this paper, we derive a quantitative relationship between the vertical gradient of age and the horizontal mixing between the tropics and the extratropics using a "leaky pipe" framework in isentropic coordinates. Mixing rates of air into and out of the tropics are related to the vertical gradient of age in the tropics and in the extratropics, respectively. The derivation is repeated with the hemispheres separated so that the vertical structure of the mixing in the two hemispheres can be compared directly. These theories are applied to output from an idealized model of the stratosphere and from a realistic chemistry‐climate model to test our assumptions and calculate the mixing rates in the models. We then perform a quantitative comparison of the mixing rates in the Northern and Southern hemispheres along with an examination of where such a separation is valid. Finally, we perform a very preliminary calculation of mixing efficiency with satellite data to demonstrate the use of the mixing metric to compare mixing in models and data. Key Points: A new metric for adiabatic mixing in the stratosphere is developed from the age of air tracerWe examine hemispheric asymmetry and discuss the slow time evolution of the flowWe calculate this metric to perform a preliminary comparison between models and satellite data [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stratospheric profiles of the mean age of air estimated from cryogenic air samples acquired during a field campaign over Indonesia, the Coordinated Upper-Troposphere-to-Stratosphere Balloon Experiment in Biak, were investigated using the boundary impulse evolving response (BIER) method and Lagrangian backward trajectories, with the aid of an atmospheric general circulation model-based chemistry transport model (ACTM). The ACTM provides realistic meteorological fields at 1-hour intervals by nudging toward the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Reanalysis-Interim. Since the BIER method is capable of taking unresolved diffusive processes into account, while the Lagrangian method can distinguish the pathways the air parcels took before reaching the sample site, the application of the two methods to the common transport field simulated by the ACTM is useful in assessing the CO2- and SF6-derived mean ages. The reliability of the simulated transport field has been verified by the reproducibility of the observed CO2, SF6, and water vapor profiles using the Lagrangian method. The profile of CO2 age is reproduced reasonably well by the Lagrangian method with a small young bias being consistent with the termination of trajectories in finite length of time, whereas the BIER method overestimates the CO2 age above the altitude of 25 km, possibly due to high diffusivity in the transport model. In contrast, the SF6 age is only reproducible in the lower stratosphere, and far exceeds the estimates from the Lagrangian method above the altitude of 25 km. As air parcels of mesospheric origin are excluded in the Lagrangian age estimation, this discrepancy, together with the fact that the observed SF6 mole fractions are much lower than the trajectoryderived values in this height region, supports the idea that the stratospheric air samples are mixed with SF6- depleted mesospheric air, leading to overestimation of the mean age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A biosafety level (BSL) laboratory is a set of biocontainment preventative measures used to prevent and isolate hazardous biological agents or their accidental release in a laboratory. It is vital to provide a negative-pressurized environment for disease infection control. The experimental equipment layout may affect the personnel’s exposure to infection. However, the equipment layout and exhaust air grilles were in a fixed position in this investigated BSL. Due to retrofitting, the layout arrangement of HEPA as supply air is investigated numerically. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulation is conducted to analyze and determine a better design for contamination control. This study proposes three ventilation arrangements as an alternative design, including vertical arrangement, horizontal arrangement, and L-shaped ventilation arrangements (instead of the supply being arranged in a single line). In addition, the airflow distribution, concentration decay, air of age, ventilation, and removal effectiveness are all examined in the study. The numerical simulation results were verified by a field measurement test. The results revealed that the L-shaped ventilation arrangement for supply air diffusers would achieve better ventilation and removal efficiency. The local mean age of air was also identified as the most satisfactory ventilation performance measure, as it shows the level of contaminant control. It also indicated that ventilation could be improved by arranging the supply air layout with less expenditure through CFD-aided simulation in identifying strategies for best practices for the design stage to reduce the running cost at full operation.

Since air quality has a great influence on students’ health and learning ability, enhancing air quality in classrooms is important. Currently, widely distributed ventilation systems operate by moving airflow horizontally from ventilation inlets and outlets on the ceiling. This method can reduce the average pollution in a space by diluting it through air exchange; however, it is limited regarding homogeneous cleanliness due to air stagnation at some locations. Therefore, in this study, a new ventilation system was devised to improve indoor air quality and spatial homogeneity by installing ventilation inlets on the ceiling and numerous outlets on the floor, creating a vertical airflow in the interior space; this system was then applied to a middle school classroom. Using the age of air as an index, air quality improvement between the existing and newly designed ventilation systems was compared. In the classroom with the existing ventilation system, the age of air was low in the area near the ventilation inlets, while air congestion areas were widely distributed and air age was high near the outlets. Conversely, in the vertical airflow classroom, the average age of air was approximately 15% lower than that with the existing ventilation system, and the deviation of air age for each position in the classroom space was also reduced, showing a uniform air age distribution. Therefore, the vertical airflow ventilation system proposed in this study can be an effective ventilation scheme for enhancing and homogenizing indoor air quality.

This study targeted a four-bed ward with a ventilation system and a four-way cassette fan coil unit (4-way FCU) installed on the ceiling. The indoor air quality under summer and winter conditions was comparatively analyzed. The age of air was calculated by conducting tests and simulations under diverse conditions, assuming that the ventilation system and 4-way FCU were continuously operating. The use of an air cleaner and ward curtain was investigated for its impact on the air quality in the breathing zone of a patient lying on the bed, and effects of the airflow and discharge angle of the 4-way FCU were considered. Because the 4-way FCU was installed in the central part of the ceiling, where indoor air is sucked in and subsequently discharged in four directions, the age of air at each bed was found to vary depending on the airflow and discharge angle of the 4-way FCU. When the airflow and discharge angle of the 4-way FCU was fixed, the age of air at each bed appeared to be lower during winter heating than in summer cooling mode. The age of air was significantly lowered at each bed, depending on the use of the curtain and the air cleaner along with the ventilation system and 4-way FCU, and appropriate seasonal operating conditions were identified to maintain a lower age of air at each bed.

This study aims to investigate the effect of the cooling load ratio covered by the chilled ceiling on the age of air and comfort level in a classroom in a hot and dry climate in Iraq-Hilla city. Air age, air exchange efficiency, and concentrations of pollutants in a classroom are investigated numerically by used AIRPAK software under displacement ventilation combined with a chilled ceiling system. Four cases are studied at different values of the cooling load covered by the chilled ceiling (0%, 25%, 50%, 80%) with respect to total classroom cooling load. Cooling load removes by chilled ceiling varied from (0 to 84.5 W/m2) based on the classroom area, and its temperature varied between (17.5-22.5oC). The displacement ventilation airflow rate was kept at 0.3m3/s, and the air temperature supply varied between (19.5-24.5oC) depend on the amount of cooling load covered by displacement ventilation. The results showed that the mean local air age increasing with height. The room mean air age increase and air exchange efficiency reduce with increasing load portion, which treated by the chilled ceiling. Increasing the portion of the load treated by chilled ceiling tends to improve comfort levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of air cleaners indoors has increased with the increase in indoor activities driven by the COVID-19 outbreak. In this study, the indoor air quality was determined at the location of each patient’s respirator in a four-bed hospital ward equipped with a ventilation system and curtains, by varying the position of one air cleaner. By operating the air cleaner alone without the ventilation system, it was confirmed that it is better to place the air cleaner close to the center of the ward, regardless of whether curtains are used. It was further identified that the farther away the air cleaner is from the center, the worse the age of air could be, compared to the case of operating it in the center. Moreover, the situation where the ventilation system and air cleaner were operated simultaneously in the hospital ward was considered. It was discovered that operating the air cleaner close to the ventilation inlets in the absence of curtains helps to improve the indoor air quality. Furthermore, it was found that the age of the air is generally low near the location where the air cleaner is operated in the presence of curtains. Selecting an optimal position for the air cleaner can improve the air quality at the location of each bed in a four-bed hospital ward.

Delineating the boundary between troposphere and stratosphere in a chemistry transport model requires a state variable for each air mass that maps out the ever shifting, overlapping three-dimensional (3-D) boundary at each time step. Using an artificial tracer, e90, with surface sources and 90 day decay time, the model e90 tropopause matches the 1-D temperature lapse rate definition of the tropopause as well as the seasonal variation of ozone at this boundary. This approach works from equator to pole, over all seasons, unlike methods based on potential vorticity or ozone. By focusing on the time scales that separate stratosphere from troposphere, we examine the cause of ozone seasonality at the midlatitude tropopause, the oldest air in the troposphere (winter descent in the subtropics), and a north-south bias in the age of air of the lowermost stratosphere as evaluated using a northern tracer. The tracer e90 is invaluable in 3-D modeling, readily separating stratosphere from troposphere and a giving quantitative measure of the effective distance from the tropopause.

The transport of trace gases by the atmospheric circulation plays an important role in the climate system and its response to external forcing. Transport presents a challenge for Atmospheric General Circulation Models (AGCMs), as errors in both the resolved circulation and the numerical representation of transport processes can bias their abundance. In this study, two tests are proposed to assess transport by the dynamical core of an AGCM. To separate transport from chemistry, the tests focus on the age‐of‐air, an estimate of the mean transport time by the circulation. The tests assess the coupled stratosphere–troposphere system, focusing on transport by the overturning circulation and isentropic mixing in the stratosphere, or Brewer–Dobson Circulation, where transport time‐scales on the order of months to years provide a challenging test of model numerics. Four dynamical cores employing different numerical schemes (finite‐volume, pseudo‐spectral, and spectral‐element) and discretizations (cubed sphere versus latitude–longitude) are compared across a range of resolutions. The subtle momentum balance of the tropical stratosphere is sensitive to model numerics, and the first intercomparison reveals stark differences in tropical stratospheric winds, particularly at high vertical resolution: some cores develop westerly jets and others easterly jets. This leads to substantial spread in transport, biasing the age‐of‐air by up to 25% relative to its climatological mean, making it difficult to assess the impact of the numerical representation of transport processes. This uncertainty is removed by constraining the tropical winds in the second intercomparison test, in a manner akin to specifying the Quasi‐Biennial Oscillation in an AGCM. The dynamical cores exhibit qualitative agreement on the structure of atmospheric transport in the second test, with evidence of convergence as the horizontal and vertical resolution is increased in a given model. Significant quantitative differences remain, however, particularly between models employing spectral versus finite‐volume numerics, even in state‐of‐the‐art cores. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The side-curtain is popular in cattle buildings to regulate indoor climates and ventilation rates by adjusting the opening ratio. It normally had three different adjusting strategies relate to the position of rollers, i.e. central roller (S1), top roller (S2) and bottom roller (S3), which result in different opening behaviors to generate the same opening ratio but different opening positions in the side wall for a full-curtain house. Numerical simulations were conducted using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to investigate the effects of the eight potential opening behaviors of side curtains on the indoor climates and airflow rates in winter for a typical naturally ventilated dairy house in China when the opening ratio were 8.5% and 17%. Airflow patterns, wind chilled temperature (WCT) and age of air were analyzed in the animal occupied zone (AOZ) by taking reference planes. Openings at the very bottom of side walls had more efficient ventilation due to the younger air age, more effective air disturbing, more uniformly distributed indicators in AOZ. However, it will result in a lower WCT in AOZ although a lower ventilation rate was observed in this case. Openings on the very top of side wall would generate a better thermal comfort in AOZ but with very poor air quality and nonuniformly distributed airflows in the dairy house. S1 was not recommended to the practical application due to the poor indoor climate and the higher cost of the mechanical structure. Based on the comprehensive evaluations of the analytic hierarchy process, the most satisfaction opening positions were at the bottom of the side curtains and the optimized adjusting strategy is S2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Total columns of the trace gases nitric acid (HNO3) and hydrogen chloride (HCl) are sensitive to variations in the lower stratospheric age of air, a quantity that describes transport time scales in the stratosphere. Analyses of HNO3 and HCl columns from the Network for the Detection of Atmospheric Composition Change panning 77°S to 79°N have detected changes in the extratropical stratospheric transport circulation from 1994 to 2018. The HNO3 and HCl analyses combined with the age of air from a simulation using the MERRA2 reanalysis show that the Southern Hemisphere lower stratosphere has become 1 month/decade younger relative to the Northern Hemisphere, largely driven by the Southern Hemisphere transport circulation. The analyses reveal multiyear anomalies with a 5‐ to 7‐year period driven by interactions between the circulation and the quasi‐biennial oscillation in tropical winds. This hitherto unrecognized variability is large relative to hemispheric transport trends and may bias ozone trend regressions. Plain Language Summary: Our analyses of the 25‐year Network for the Detection of Atmospheric Composition Change column HNO3 and HCl data records from nine stations provide observational evidence that air in the Southern Hemisphere lower stratosphere has been getting younger relative to the Northern Hemisphere at a rate of 1 month/decade since 1994. This stands in contrast to several model studies that predict that Antarctic ozone hole recovery in this century will increase the Southern Hemisphere age of air relative to the Northern Hemisphere. The analyses also reveal extratropical variability with a 5‐ to 7‐year period driven by interactions between the circulation and tropical winds. This previously unrecognized, low‐frequency variability is much larger than hemispheric transport trends and is likely to cause bias in trends calculated using data records shorter than about two decades. Understanding and quantifying changes in the transport circulation matters to our ability to model how our protective O3 layer will evolve in the future. Key Points: Trace gas data show southern stratospheric air is getting younger relative to the Northern Hemisphere, in contrast to model predictionsBoth extratropical hemispheres have dynamically driven 5‐ to 7‐year periodicity with large amplitude relative to the age trendMultidecadal data sets are required to quantify transport trends that are not confounded by large extratropical variability [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Energy and momentum deposition from planetary-scale Rossby waves as well as from small-scale gravity waves (GWs) largely control stratospheric dynamics. Interactions between these different wave types, however, complicate the quantification of their individual contribution to the overall dynamical state of the middle atmosphere. In state-of-the-art general circulation models (GCMs), the majority of the GW spectrum cannot be resolved and therefore has to be parameterised. This is commonly implemented in two discrete schemes, one for GWs that originate from flow over orographic obstacles and one for all other kinds of GWs (non-orographic GWs). In this study, we attempt to gain a deeper understanding of the interactions of resolved with parameterised wave driving and of their influence on the stratospheric zonal winds and on the Brewer–Dobson circulation (BDC). For this, we set up a GCM time slice experiment with two sensitivity simulations: one without orographic GWs and one without non-orographic GWs. Our findings include an acceleration of the polar vortices, which has historically been one of the main reasons for including explicit GW parameterisations in GCMs. Further, we find inter-hemispheric differences in BDC changes when omitting GWs that can be explained by wave compensation and amplification effects. These are partly evoked through local changes in the refractive properties of the atmosphere caused by the omitted GW drag and a thereby increased planetary wave propagation. However, non-local effects on the flow can act to suppress vertical wave fluxes into the stratosphere for a very strong polar vortex. Moreover, we study mean age of stratospheric air to investigate the impact of missing GWs on tracer transport. On the basis of this analysis, we suggest that the larger ratio of planetary waves to GWs leads to enhanced horizontal mixing, which can have a large impact on stratospheric tracer distributions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the recent pandemic of COVID-19, scientists have made many efforts to devise a workable solution for it, worldwide. However, it was shown that the protective effect of a well-conditioning system is as high as five times in comparison to the face-covering and other proposed procedures. In this context, the age of air and the type of filtration systems in closed spaces became the critical criteria for comparing the capability of ventilation systems. In this paper, a validated numerical model for the perforated duct diffusers is used to study the behaviour of the local age of air at the full-scale office with 8 feet (2.44 [m]) height, under various initial conditions like initial velocity and air change per hour. Also, different geometries for the ducts have been investigated under the same initial condition, as well as the effect of direction, ventilation effectiveness, and flow pattern. Finally, the volume average of the age of air at different zones has been nominated to perform the sensitivity analysis of each variable based on the variation of the airflow. The results show that diffusers with vertical perforations would be more effective during the pandemic than the other types in airborne mitigation. Moreover, the highest available airflow shall be set until such time there is no windy area in the breathing zone. Within these modifications, the residence time of the infectious nuclei in the breathing zone may decrease by up to 30%., Competing Interests: There is no conflict of interest., (© 2024 Published by Elsevier Ltd.)

Substantial increases in the atmospheric concentration of well‐mixed greenhouse gases (notably CO2), such as those projected to occur by the end of the 21st century under large radiative forcing scenarios, have long been known to cause an acceleration of the Brewer‐Dobson circulation (BDC) in climate models. More recently, however, several single‐model studies have proposed that ozone‐depleting substances might also be important drivers of BDC trends. As these studies were conducted with different forcings over different periods, it is difficult to combine them to obtain a robust quantitative picture of the relative importance of ozone‐depleting substances as drivers of BDC trends. To this end, we here analyze—over identical past and future periods—the output from 20 similarly forced models, gathered from two recent chemistry‐climate modeling intercomparison projects. Our multimodel analysis reveals that ozone‐depleting substances are responsible for more than half of the modeled BDC trends in the two decades 1980–2000. We also find that, as a consequence of the Montreal Protocol, decreasing concentrations of ozone‐depleting substances in coming decades will strongly decelerate the BDC until the year 2080, reducing the age‐of‐air trends by more than half, and will thus substantially mitigate the impact of increasing CO2. As ozone‐depleting substances impact BDC trends, primarily, via the depletion/recovery of stratospheric ozone over the South Pole, they impart seasonal and hemispheric asymmetries to the trends which may offer opportunities for detection in coming decades. Key Points: Impacts of ozone‐depleting substances (ODS) on Brewer‐Dobson circulation trends are analyzed in 20 chemistry‐climate modelsFor the period 1980–2000 ODS have contributed more than half (roughly 60%) of the stratospheric age‐of‐air trendsFor the period 2000–2080 models show that decreasing ODS levels will substantially decelerate the BDC [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has recently been recognized that, in addition to greenhouse gases, anthropogenic emissions of ozone‐depleting substances (ODS) can induce long‐term trends in the Brewer‐Dobson circulation (BDC). Several studies have shown that a substantial fraction of the residual circulation acceleration over the last decades of the twentieth century can be attributed to increasing ODS. Here the mechanisms of this influence are examined, comparing model runs to reanalysis data and evaluating separately the residual circulation and mixing contributions to the mean age of air trends. The effects of ozone depletion in the Antarctic lower stratosphere are found to dominate the ODS impact on the BDC, while the direct radiative impact of these substances is negligible over the period of study. We find qualitative agreement in austral summer BDC trends between model and reanalysis data and show that ODS are the main driver of both residual circulation and isentropic mixing trends over the last decades of the twentieth century. Moreover, aging by isentropic mixing is shown to play a key role on ODS‐driven age of air trends. Plain Language Summary: Concentrations of human‐emitted ozone‐depleting substances in the stratosphere have increased substantially during the last decades of the twentieth century, which are found in the Southern Hemisphere. These substances have caused stratospheric ozone depletion, which not only has important direct impacts on human health but also leads to important changes in the atmospheric circulation and climate. Here the impact of these substances on the stratospheric mean transport circulation is examined using chemistry‐climate model simulations and reanalysis data. In addition to destroying ozone, these substances act as greenhouse gases. In this paper, we find that the radiative forcing impacts of human‐emitted ozone‐depleting substances on the stratospheric circulation over the last decades of the twentieth century are negligible. In contrast, the Antarctic ozone hole has contributed substantially to the acceleration of stratospheric tracer transport not only in the polar region but globally. The impacts, largest in the austral summer stratosphere, are examined in detail separating the overturning circulation and irreversible mixing. It is shown that trends in the model compare qualitatively well with estimates from two different reanalyses. This paper contributes to advance our understanding of the impact of human emissions on the stratospheric circulation and to untangle the forcings of recent trends. Key Points: Increasing ODS have played a key role in observed BDC trends over the last decades of the twentieth centuryOzone depletion dominates the ODS impact on BDC trends, while the radiative effect of these substances is negligibleIncluding changes in mixing in addition to the residual circulation is crucial to interpreting past mean age trends [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effect of temperature of the heating system elements is a parameter that could affect the airflow in terms of buoyancy and thermal comfort and that should be studied to ensure the quality of ventilation. This study aimed to assess the air change efficiency and thermal comfort with three thermal conditioning systems (radiators, underfloor heating and radiant ceiling) in winter conditions, varying its position in the interior space. This can be used by architects and engineers when planning the position of the heating systems or refurbishing a room. The experimental analysis was developed in the test chamber of the Laboratory of Ventilation of the University of Valladolid, serving as validation of multiple CFD simulations. The results show that, being the thermal comfort achieved, the mean air change efficiency varied only 2.40% among all cases, which makes this factor not significant. Even so, the trajectory of the airflow in the premise would be affected by the thermal action, due to the convective effect, presenting great differences according to the location of the thermal systems. Thus, the air trajectory could falter when it enters the room or rise towards the ceiling creating areas with lower temperature in its centre. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In developed countries, presence at home varies between 60% and 90% of the day, sleeping supposes 30%. Therefore, it is essential to ensure good indoor air quality that enhances health and benefits rest and recovery. In this context, it is necessary to achieve a balance between energy efficiency and air distribution parameters; thus, the influence exerted by the furniture of a bedroom on the air exchange efficiency, in the breathing zone during sleep, is assessed in this study. Computational fluid dynamics techniques, experimentally validated by the tracer gas (SF6) concentration decay method, are used to analyze 52 case studies corresponding to the same space, but varying both the number and the arrangement of the furniture inside. It is concluded that, in order to achieve a significant improvement in the air exchange efficiency, the number of elements included in the bedroom is not relevant, but the position of them. The highest increase in the ventilation efficiency in breathing zone is observed when the furniture is located avoiding the airflow obstruction in the area near the inlet and creating an unfilled volume of air in the area close to the outlet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People spend most of their time indoors; therefore, maintaining a good indoor air quality and meeting the requirements of comfort and energy efficiency are essential. One of the most widespread strategies to achieve this objective is improving ventilation efficiency; therefore, the main aim of this study was to show an optimization of the ventilation efficiency, in a specific room, considering 47 variations (case studies) in the furniture arrangement. For this purpose, a numerical analysis using computational fluid dynamics techniques, validated by the tracer gas decay technique, was used to assess the distribution of the age of air within the space. The concept of “age of air” was implemented in the computational fluid dynamics code through user-defined functions, using the steady-state method based on the resolution of a transport equation for an additional scalar. Variations up to 5.75% in the ventilation efficiency between the cases studied have been achieved. It is concluded that an improvement up to 1.65% can be obtained when the elements of the study are introduced in a way that facilitates the air movement towards the exhaust; therefore, improvement of the ventilation efficiency through specific furniture distributions is possible, although not significant, according to the outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Observational records of the stratospheric mean age of air (AoA), the average transit time of an air parcel since entering the stratosphere, must reflect changes in the in‐mixing from the extratropical lower stratosphere to the tropical tropopause layer (TTL). Focusing on the mixing fraction of tropospheric and stratospheric air masses in the upper TTL, the impact of mixing processes that occur prior to air masses entering the stratosphere separately from those that occur within the stratosphere is investigated. Using trajectory analysis, the mixing fraction during 1980–2016 is evaluated, and AoA and water vapor mixing ratios in the upper TTL are reconstructed. The interannual variation in the reconstructed water vapor shows good agreement with observations in the tropics. Furthermore, the reconstructed AoA exhibits long‐term variation with a positive trend between 1980 and 1999. To compare the reconstructed AoA with the observed AoA in the midlatitude stratosphere, the transit time spectra are estimated for the 1989–2016 period, and the AoA in the midlatitude stratosphere is estimated by integration of the spectrum together with the AoA in the upper TTL. As a result, although the explicitly calculated transit time shows a clear underestimation compared with previous studies, it is suggested that the “aging” effects are 3.1–4.2 years for transit time in the stratosphere, 0.2–0.7 years for in‐mixing prior to entering the stratosphere, 0.1 years for transit time from the troposphere to upper TTL, and 0.0–1.6 years for subgrid‐scale mixing in the stratosphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cross-ventilation using rooftop wind-catchers is very complex as it is influenced by a wide range of interrelated factors including aerodynamic characteristics of the wind catcher, approach-flow conditions and building geometry. Earlier studies on wind-driven cross-ventilation in buildings have shown the significant impact of the geometry and position of openings on the flow and ventilation performance. However, this has not yet been investigated for cross-ventilation using wind catchers. This paper, therefore, presents a detailed evaluation of the impact of the outlet openings on the ventilation performance of a single-zone isolated building with a wind catcher. The evaluation is based on three ventilation performance indicators: (i) induced airflow rate, (ii) age of air, and (iii) air change efficiency. High-resolution coupled 3D steady RANS CFD simulations of cross-ventilation are performed for different sizes and types of outlet openings. The CFD simulations are validated based on wind-tunnel measurements. The results show that using outlet openings very close to the wind catcher will not increase the induced airflow, while it leads to a considerable reduction in the indoor air quality. A combination of one-sided wind-catcher and window is superior, while the use of two-sided wind-catchers leads to the lowest indoor air quality and air change efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chilled beams provide sensible cooling to an occupied space by using chilled water flowing through modular beams mounted to a room ceiling. Previous studies show that active chilled beam systems can achieve larger sensible cooling than all-air systems. However, most studies have focused on active chilled beams and little information is available for performance of passive chilled beam (PCB) under varied ventilation conditions. The objective of the present study is to investigate ventilation and air conditioning performance of combined PCB and displacement ventilation systems. Using a validated and verified computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model, parametric analyses were performed to examine the ventilation and air conditioning performance depending on five major operating parameters: 1) ventilation strategy, 2) PCB cooling output, 3) supply air temperature, 4) supply diffuser type, and 5) internal heat source arrangement. The results show that thermal comfort and ventilation performance of a combined PCB-DV system notably vary with the PCB cooling output and supply air temperature. When the PCB cooling output increases from 33% to 53% of the total cooling load, air change effectiveness decreases from 1.6 to 1.2 and vertical temperature difference decreases from 4.0 °C to 1.5 °C in the breathing zone. However, spatial heat source distribution has a marginal effect on the air mixing and temperature distribution. The results suggest that a relatively high PCB cooling output (>50% of the total cooling) combined with a low supply air temperature ( e.g. , 17 °C) could disrupt thermal stratification of displacement ventilation and increase draft rate in the occupied zone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Street networks serve as the main open corridors for wind flow within urban areas, so understanding their ventilation performance and capacity of removing pollutants helps improve urban air quality. However, conventional modelling methods using an exact building model (EBM) are hard-pressed to simulate urban-scale areas, due to their extremely high computing load. To reduce time and cost of numerical simulations, and accurately predict the flow field and ventilation within the street network, a simplified modelling approach (i.e., EBM&PMM) is proposed, in which only the first row of buildings flanking the street is modelled by EBM and the rest of the urban buildings are modelled by a porous media model (PMM). The performance of EBM&PMM is evaluated by three common modelling approaches, i.e., EBM, PMM, and sealed concrete model (SCM) in which the building complexes with gaps are treated as an enclosed entity. A typical crossing street network flanked by four communities (building arrays) is used for this study. The age of air (τ P) and ventilation flux (Q) obtained from the four modelling methods are compared. The results show that EBM&PMM predicts τ P and Q well, and the flow pattern by this model agrees well with EBM. PMM significantly underestimates τ P but exaggerates Q in street networks, and it fails to give the detailed flow patterns. SCM over-predicts τ P , and Q between the community and street is zero. Furthermore, the first row of buildings facing the street plays a decisive role in flow pattern and ventilation effectiveness of the street network. [Display omitted] • Airflow in streets is simulated by exact building model and porous media model (EBM&PMM). • EBM&PMM predicts the flow pattern and ventilation processes well in street networks. • PMM and sealed concrete models fail to simulate flows and pollution in the network. • First building rows beside a street play decisive roles in simulations by the EBM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]