Evaluation of the Impact of Fan Coil Airflow Velocity on the Micron Particles Distribution in the Human Breathing Zone

Document Type : Research Article

Authors

1 Department of mechanical engineering, University of Birjand

2 University of Birjand

3 Faculty member of Birjand university

4 Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman

Abstract

Nowadays, most people spend their time in the interior spaces. Therefore, particulate pollutants in these spaces are serious threat to the human health. Hence, the investigation on distribution and deposition of particle pollutants in indoor spaces is important for assessing the indoor air quality. Due to the wide use of heating/cooling fan coils in the buildings, the effect of fan coil airflow velocity on the concentration of micron particles of 1, 10 and 100 microns in the breathing zone of seating (0.9 to 1.1 m) and standing (1.5 to 1.7 m) people has been studied in this article. For this purpose, by using the computational fluid dynamics and a developed code by the authors in OpenFOAM, the particle concentration is investigated in a room with a fan coil airflow velocity at 1.5 and 3 m/s. The results show that the large particles (100 microns) have not a significant effect on air quality and they settle down after about 10 seconds. In the other hand, the smaller particles (10 and 1 micron) have a major impact on ventilation conditions and they settle down after about 800 seconds. The results indicate that the fan coil velocity increases, also the results show that more particles are filtered by the filter in the fan coil by increasing fan coil velocity and the percentage of particles deposited on the floor reduced. For example, for 10 microns particles, by increasing fan coil velocity from 1.5 to 3 m/s, the percentage of deposited particles on the floor is reduced from 26% to 17%.

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References

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Amirkabir Journal of Mechanical Engineering
Volume 52, Issue 6
September 2020
Pages 1675-1686

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