“We all grew up hearing our elders tell us to "go out and get some fresh air." Have you wondered, why?

“What is fresh air and why do we need fresh air for our survival? “And how much fresh air is required in order to enjoy a better life?”

The answers to these questions can be found by having a better understanding of what fresh air is and how its presence or absence in our immediate living environment impact us.

 

WHAT IS FRESH AIR?

We need air to survive. Health of one’s body and mind to a great degree depends upon the amount of pure, fresh air one breathes.

However most people do not pay attention to the health benefits of spending time outdoors and increasingly prefer staying indoors in sealed air-conditioned environments that lack fresh air. This often leads to serious health problems.

IS THERE EVEN A NEED OF FRESH AIR?

The air that you breathe indoors is not as fresh as your body needs to remain healthy. This is why health experts highly recommend taking a break from the indoor air and to go out to enjoy fresh air. There are many health benefits of fresh air, such as:

1. Fresh air cleans the lungs and helps to bring more oxygen to the cells and improves the cleansing action of your lungs.
2. More oxygen also brings greater clarity to the brain, which needs twenty percent of our body’s oxygen to function.
3. Fresh air is good for digestion as it helps you to digest food more effectively.
4. Fresh air also improves your blood pressure and heart rate.
5. Fresh air is also essential to make your immune system strong.

“People spend a lot of time indoors every day. Children spend around six hours a day in school. Most adults spend at least eight hours inside of the buildings where they work and nearly everybody spends evening and night times at homes: eating, playing, and sleeping.”

“So, how harmful can indoor air be? “ To understand that we need to learn about the indoor air quality and how it’s quality affects people.

 

WHAT IS INDOOR AIR QUALITY?

The air quality within and around buildings and structures, especially as it relates to the health and comfort of building occupants is known as INDOOR AIR QUALITY.

 

The quality of indoor air in many cases has been adversely impacted because of emissions from variety of sources and has an adverse impact on a person’s health. The table below lists the main causes of such harmful emissions.

A BRIEF ABOUT THE GASES EMITTED FROM WITH THEIR IMPACT ON BEINGS…

S.NO.	GASES	EMITTED FROM	EFFECTS
1.	Carbon Monoxide	Tobacco Smoke, Space Heaters Using Fossil Fuels, Automobile Exhaust, Defective Central Heating Furnaces	Loss Of Balance, Vision Problems, Memory Problems
2.	Molds And Other Allergens	Moisture Induced Growth, Natural Substances Released Into The Air	Trigger Episodes In Persons having Asthma
3.	Second-Hand Smoke	Affects Other People Other Than The 'Active' smoker	Heart Attack, Angina (Chest Pain) And Heart Failure
4.	Volatile Organic Compounds	Paints And Lacquers, Paint Strippers, Cleaning Supplies, Pesticides, Building Materials And Furnishings	Eye, Nose, And Throat Irritation, Headaches, Loss Of Coordination, Nausea, And Damage To The Liver
5.	Carbon Dioxide	Emitted By Humans, And Correlates With Human Metabolic Activity	Occupants Grow Drowsy, To Get Headaches, Or To Function At Lower Activity Levels.
6.	Emissions from Heating Equipment	Stoves, Heaters, Fireplaces, Chimneys	Headaches, Dizziness, Fatigue, And Even Death If Not Ventilated Properly

 

STEPS THAT WE CAN TAKE IN ORDER TO MAKE A “PART” OF AIR CLEAN IN INDOORS.

1. Smoking is one of the most common types of indoor air pollution. The best thing to do is to quit smoking and make your home an anti-smoking zone. The less smoke that is emitted into the air the lesser the chance of one of the listed effects happening to someone that you love.

2. Make sure you check the ingredients on any of your cleaning supplies to make sure they are environmentally friendly. You can also find an environmentally friendly cleaning list online so you know exactly what to buy.

3. If you have a home that was built prior to the ban of asbestos, it is important to make sure there is none still lingering within the home.

4. Have your home inspected for any mold, radon, or any other harmful chemical or bacteria that may be in your home. These types of inspections are traditionally done before you move in so keep that in mind as well.

5. Use a good vacuum cleaner that has strong brushes to keep out chemicals and allergens that can accumulate in your home. Areas in your home which are most commonly visited must be cleaned thoroughly by using the vacuum several times.

6. Most of the dirt comes in the home from the shoes. Keep a large mat outside every room that will reduce the amount of dirt, and other pollutants from getting into your home.

 

“BUT IS THAT ALL?”

Are the above stated problems and solutions all that there is to it? Can we be safe and can live a happy life if we live by these guidelines? The answer to this would be “NO!!!”

 

!!!CAUTION!!!
One of the often ignored issues is that with scorching heat outside we prefer switching on air conditioners. The air that is being supplied by the air conditioners is not fresh and mainly consists of air reused by the air filters.

The main aim of the air conditioning system is to distribute conditioned air to a space in order to improve the thermal comfort of that enclosed space.

• STAGE 1: In this cycle, a circulating refrigerant such as “Freon” enters the compressor as a vapor. The vapor is compressed at constant gradual decline and exits the compressor when it is superheated.
• STAGE 2: The superheated vapor travels through the condenser which first cools and removes the superheat and then condenses the vapor into a liquid by removing additional heat at constant pressure and temperature.
• STAGE 3: The liquid refrigerant goes through the expansion valve (also called a throttle valve) where its pressure abruptly decreases, causing flash evaporation and auto-refrigeration of, typically, less than half of the liquid.
• STAGE 4: The cold liquid-vapor mixture then travels through the evaporator coil or tubes and is completely vaporized by cooling the warm air (from the space being refrigerated) being blown by a fan across the evaporator coil or tubes. The resulting refrigerant vapor returns to the compressor inlet to complete the thermodynamic cycle

 

THE CAUSES… WHAT IT CAN ACTUALLY LEAD TO?

• Itchy eyes? Dizziness? Dry throat? (SICK BUILDING SYNDROME)

Sick building syndrome is a condition affecting office workers, typically marked by headaches and respiratory problems, attributed to unhealthy or stressful factors in the working environment such as poor ventilation.

Air conditioners can contribute to sick building syndrome, a variety of conditions that are brought on by time spent in certain indoor environments. Symptoms may include dizziness, dry throat, itchy eyes and nausea.

• Cracking and stretching of skin even in the season of summers? (DRY SKIN)

Spending too much time in an air-conditioned room may have a bad effect on your skin as air conditioning may have a drying effect on it and the mucous membranes. Long hours spent in air conditioned environments causes your skin to lose moisture; if you are not aiding your skin with a constant supply of moisturizers you may begin to suffer from dry skin.

• Shivering at your office desk in mid-July?(ILLNESS AND CONSTANT FATIGUE)

Research shows that people who work in over air-conditioned environments may experience chronic headaches and fatigue. Those who work in buildings which are constantly being pumped full of cool air may also experience constant mucous membrane irritation and breathing difficulties. This leaves you more vulnerable to contracting colds, flu’s and other illnesses.

• Too much heat to go out!!! (THE INABILITY TO DEAL WITH HEAT)

Those who spent a lot of time in an air conditioned environment become increasingly more intolerant of hot summer temperatures. This is mainly caused by the stress on your body from moving from a cool environment to the sweltering outdoor air. This intolerance of the heat has led to an increase heat related deaths during heat waves, which now averages at 400 deaths each summer.

• From pinch of illness to complete illness. (ADDS TO CHRONIC DISEASES)

Central air conditioning systems are known to enhance the effects the illness that you may already be suffering from. Air-conditioning is notorious for aggravating the symptoms of low blood pressure, arthritis, and another such health conditions.

There are two types of air that we experience. QUALITY AIR and COMFORT AIR.

 

COMFORT AIR

In buildings of office space, executive floors, architecture cabinets and all offices where people remain seated most of the time, the degree of comfort to be achieved is critical and directly linked to the people productivity!!!!

Implying COMFORT = PRODUCTIVITY.

Or let’s frame it this way... comfort conditioning is the process of altering the condition of air by removing heat and humidity to achieve a more comfortable interior environment, typically with the aim of distributing the conditioned air to an occupied space such as a building to improve thermal comfort and indoor air quality.

 

QUALITY AIR

The condition of the air within our surroundings which pertains to the degree with which the air is clean, clear and free from pollutants such as smoke, dust and smog among other gaseous impurities in the air.

Air quality is determined by assessing a variety of pollution indicators. Good air quality is a requirement for preserving the balance of life on earth for humans, plants, animals and natural resources. As such, human health, plants, animals and natural resources are threatened when pollution in the air reach high concentrations.

 

SO IN A NUTSHELL…

Both comfort air and quality air essential for our wellbeing. As excess of comfort air for the sake of thermal comfort ability is not beneficial as it reuses the conditioned air, likewise just quality air cannot help us with the thermal comfort ability.

“But if we talk about the people living in the past sustained without the use of air conditioners and still they managed to live happily. Ever wondered how?”

“How are lifestyles  different today?”

 

SUMMER HEAT WAVE “BEFORE AIR CONDITIONERS “

In the past, people discovered various passive cooling techniques that helped them survive the scorching temperatures of the summers. Some of the techniques that were used include:

 

“SIX FEET UNDER FOR A GOOD REASON”

  In this a space is partially created by digging a hole in the ground with which cooling or heating in the premises can be done, thus with the help of the big dug out place in the earth the air which is being circulated in the premises gets cool or heated down depending upon climatic condition of that space.

“THEY WENT FURTHER DOWN STEP BY STEP” This technique was also known as “STEP POOL”. They constructed a stepped well in which when water evaporates, it lowers the air temperature in the premises.

“FLOW-THROUGH VENTILATION” In many buildings the summer heat is managed through the principle of flow through ventilation. Units are set in widows at opposite ends of the house, one to exhaust and the other to pull in fresh air, they can be tremendously effective at cooling the home in the evening, nighttime and early morning hours.

 

SUMMER HEAT WAVE IN THE “MODERN TIMES”

 “LOW ENERGY BUT EFFICIENT”
Low energy cooling techniques aim to reduce energy consumption and peak electricity demand. They do so by making use of low energy (i.e. low quality) cooling sources such as the ambient air, the ground or surface water. These technologies are also referred to as passive or hybrid cooling systems.

“CEILING HEATING AND COOLING”
In this buildings are heated by a ceiling (slab) heating system, commonly known as Critttal system. This system consists of a serpentine heating pipe embedded in the concrete massive ceiling.

“OPERATIVE TEMPERATURE”
An operative temperature was to be chosen based on the evaluation criterion for thermal comfort in air conditioned spaces with the help of radiant heating or cooling.

 

“AN EFFICIENT PAST AND AMORE EFFICIENT FUTURE… BUT WHERE ARE WE?”

For the people now in India in the present century “air conditioner has become a social and status symbol. “People are discarding their old, traditional homes made of bricks, mud, adobe, timber, bamboo, etc., in exchange for boxes made of concrete and glass in pursuit of modernization, which consumes a lot of operational energy.”

We need to make people more aware and bring in certain changes to become more efficient and save more energy for future generations.

 

SUN- ‘THE ULTIMATE POWER SOURCE’

 “Every morning the sun rises, bringing light and heat to the earth, and every evening it sets. It seems so commonplace that we rarely spare a thought for that bright object in the sky. Yet without it, we wouldn't exist!”

We use many different forms of energy here on earth, almost of all them originate with the sun including light and heat (thermal) energy!

The law of conservation of energy says that energy can't be created or destroyed, but can change its form. And that's what happens with energy from the sun—it changes into lots of different forms.

The radiation from the sun is an emission of energy and this energy should be used efficiently in a systematic manner. One of the methods of doing so is radiant cooling.

 

RADIANT COOLING:

WHY RADIANT COOLING?

 Radiant heating and radiant cooling systems are different from typical HVAC systems because they heat or cool surfaces rather than air.  

The warm or cool surfaces then radiate heat to occupants.  The surfaces also conduct heat to people that touch them, and warm or cool the air by convection as well.

Radiant systems are more efficient than forced air heating or cooling because there are no duct losses. Also, in heating applications, heat is delivered low in the room where occupants are, rather than at the ceiling from overhead ducts.

 

WHAT IS RADIANT COOLING?

A radiant cooling system refers to a temperature-controlled surface that cools indoor temperatures by removing sensible heat and where more than half of heat transfer occurs through thermal radiation.

 

HOW IT WORKS?

Radiant cooling systems are using circulating water running in pipes in thermal contact with the surface.

Radiant cooling cools a floor or ceiling by absorbing the heat radiated from the rest of the room. When the floor is cooled, it is often referred to as radiant floor cooling; cooling the ceiling is usually done in homes with radiant panels.

Typically, the circulating water only needs to be 2-4 °C below the desired indoor air temperature. Once having been absorbed by the actively cooled surface, the heat is removed by water flowing through a hydronic circuit, replacing the warmed water with cooler water.

Since the majority of the cooling process results from removing sensible heat through radiant exchange with people and objects and not air, occupant thermal comfort can be achieved with warmer interior air temperatures than with air based cooling systems.

As a result of the high cooling capacity of water, and the delivery of a cooled surface close to the desired indoor air temperature, radiant cooling systems potentially offer reductions in cooling energy consumption.

The latent loads (humidity) from occupants, infiltration and processes generally need to be managed by an independent system. Radiant cooling may also be integrated with other energy-efficient strategies such as night time flushing, indirect evaporative cooling, or ground source heat pumps as it requires a small difference in temperature between desired indoor air temperature and the cooled surface.

 

HOW IS IT BENEFICIAL?

ADAPTABILITY

Radiant cooling pipes may be embedded in floors, ceilings, walls or other exposed surfaces.

 

ARCHITECTURAL FREEDOM

Pipes are embedded on ceilings, walls, floors, etc. and ductwork sized for fresh-air and latent cooling (dehumidification) can be hung without objection.

 

CONTROL

The outdoor temperature sensor on the northern side of the building is not exposed to direct sunlight. Moreover, the humidity and temperature sensor(s) in each zone in order to monitor dew points and set points are installed.

EFFICIENCY

A radiant cooling allows a higher space set-point temperature, while still maintaining the same level of cooling comfort compared to a traditional air handling unit (AHU).
-Loads can be reduced.

The superior heat transfer properties of water compared to air allows the hydronic portion of the system to efficiently distribute energy to conditioned spaces. A 60-watt circulator can deliver the same energy as a 1,500-watt air distribution fan; a 90% reduction.

Operating with moderate supply water temperatures allows the integration of renewable systems such as Geothermal heat pumps at maximum efficiencies.

-Radiant cooling systems typically work with fluid temperatures of 60 degree F to 63 degree F, resulting in higher EER ratings in cooling mode.

 

AIR CONDITIONING SYSTEM OR RADIANT COOLING. WHAT TO CHOOSE?

1.  In more typical applications, radiant systems are more efficient than forced air heating or cooling because there are no duct losses.
2. Radiant systems can lower building costs with the piping used for cooling incorporated into precast concrete flooring and the reduction of ceiling heights since only about 20% of the ducting is required as compared to traditional systems.
3. An all-air systems control only the air temperature while a radiant system combined with a ventilation system controls both the air and radiant temperature.
4. A radiant system removes excess airflow and helps occupants cool down by absorbing their excess heat. It is efficient and comfortable.

Traditional forced air systems provide quick and effective cooling due to air flow. The effect of cooling is almost instantaneous when entering a building on a hot day and have the cooled air rush through the space. The risk faced with such rapid cooling or heating is overcooling or overheating.

 

SO IN A NUTSHELL…

In summary, it is clear to see that both means of cooling have their strengths. A forced air system is widely adopted making parts and professional installers readily available. Its versatility as both heating and cooling system in one and air purification make it an attractive option indeed.

Radiant conditioning systems however, seem to hold all the trump cards. With the drive to build better, greener buildings while providing occupants with optimal thermal comfort and keeping costs under control, it provides architects, engineers and owners with the perfect means to achieve the desired outcome.  

 

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