Ventilation Effectiveness Toolkit
Understanding the effectiveness of ventilation allows us to determine whether occupants are benefiting from the introduction of outside air into internal spaces. Milieu has worked with clients over the past decade to develop innovative and carefully considered ventilation solutions assessing the way spaces are used.
Our ventilation effectiveness toolkit has been developed using the experience gained with the design and installation of hundreds of projects and combined with best-practice research developed by academic institutions*.
Milieu has developed a computational model that analyses the ventilation effectiveness of existing, proposed and recently installed mechanical and natural ventilation arrangements to calculate the effectiveness of ventilation.
The transmission of viruses, such as COVID-19, is now generally accepted to be through respiratory droplets which can be mitigated by sufficient and effective ventilation, see our insights article – Engineering for Health: improving ventilation in commercial spaces.
Milieu has developed a framework toolkit which enables property owners and occupiers to understand the effectiveness of ventilation across its asset portfolio and spaces. Undertaking a survey and review of the arrangements allows us to determine the risks that arise from poor ventilation. The outputs present the relative risk increase (RRI) of transmission of viruses between.
Our analysis allows us to inform you of the following:
- The number of occupants that should not be exceeded within a space
- The frequency and length of occupancy time
- Activity type of occupants
- The risk level of transmission of viruses.
We are able to model capital projects and the benefits of improvements such as:
- Increase the rate of outside air infiltration (mechanical and natural)
- Adjust the ventilation arrangements (velocities, direction, supply and extract distribution)
- Identify space occupancy, utilisation and activity type and levels
- The benefits of monitoring and active ventilation control systems.
* Our computational modelling uses resources from MIT, University of Colorado and CIBSE.
