Natural Ventilation of Toilet Units in K–12 School Restrooms Using CFD
Author:
Open Access
Abstract
In this study, the influence of architectural design parameters (the exterior window area, the wall height at a corridor-side, and the door gap of a toilet unit) on the airflow patterns and malodorous volatile substance (acetic acid) distributions within toilet units were investigated via computational fluid dynamics (CFD), with the restrooms in K–12 public schools (kindergarten through grade 12) of Taiwan as research objects. The results show that when there is a 2 m/s north wind in winter, all the cases exceed the required 12 air changes per hour (ACH), and most are above 43.75 ACH. When there is a 0.5 m/s south wind in summer, nearly half of the cases fail to reach 12 ACH. Maintaining an adequate natural ventilation rate and an acceptable level of odor pollution through passive design and architectural design is difficult. Thinking about how to improve the ventilation efficiency of toilet units with the aid of simple, appropriate, and energy-saving mechanical ventilation approaches is necessary.Keywords
This publication has 12 references indexed in Scilit:
- The impact of operating pressure on residential bathroom exhaust fan performanceJournal of Building Engineering, 2016
- On the Design to Improve the Bathroom Exhaust Performance in Multi-Unit Residential BuildingsJournal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering, 2016
- Improvement of ventilation efficiency by changing the shape of glass partition in bathroom of apartment houseIndoor and Built Environment, 2016
- Study of bathroom ventilation fan performance trends for years 2005 to 2013—Data analysis of loudness and efficacyEnergy and Buildings, 2016
- Computational Fluid Dynamics for urban physics: Importance, scales, possibilities, limitations and ten tips and tricks towards accurate and reliable simulationsBuilding and Environment, 2015
- Study for flow and mass transfer in toilet bowl by using toilet seat adopting odor/bacteria suction featureBuilding and Environment, 2013
- Experimental performance investigation of ventilation schemes in a private bathroomBuilding and Environment, 2010
- Influence of bathroom ventilation rates and toilet location on odor removalBuilding and Environment, 2009
- AIJ guidelines for practical applications of CFD to pedestrian wind environment around buildingsJournal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics, 2008
- Analysis of Malodorous Substances of Human Feces.Journal of Health Science, 2002