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Home Energy Magazine Online January/February 2000
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Ventilation for Apartment Buildings
The latest from the U.S. Department of Energy in the Rebuild America Guide series is Energy-Efficient Ventilation for Apartment Buildings (DOE/EE-0196, August 1999). While previous guides in this series have dealt with general topics for advancing energy efficiency, this is the first that was requested by a Rebuild Partner (Rebuild Boston) to address a technical issue--namely, how to improve the ventilation and energy efficiency in multifamily housing. The guide covers ventilation basics, ventilation diagnostics, and the design of ventilation systems--both new and retrofit--and includes the all-important topics of operations and maintenance, to ensure that apartment dwellers receive sufficient ventilation in their homes. Different ventilation strategies are considered for different building types, with comparisons of central and distributed systems, supply and exhaust, and different inlet and outlet configurations to provide air flow. The related issues of health, comfort, noise, and cost are also discussed. Appendices include frequently asked questions, a ventilation audit, a glossary of terms, and more than 80 references.
The guide, authored by staff at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, was the outcome of a workshop convened in Boston, Massachusetts, in November 1996 to address what was known about how to provide energy-efficient ventilation in multifamily buildings. Although many aspects of multifamily ventilation are yet to be explored, the guide is an attempt to pull together much of what researchers have learned over the past 20 years. Copies of this and other Rebuild Guides are available free from DOE. For more information, call 1-800-DOE-EREC or visit www.eren.doe.gov.
-- Rick Diamond
Rick Diamond is a building scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and one of the authors of the book.
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