Positive pressure effect on moisture performance in a school building

Andrea Ferrantelli*, Camilla Vornanen-Winqvist, Milla Mattila, Heidi Salonen, Jarek Kurnitski

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

6 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Moisture excess in buildings constitutes a complex problem affecting indoor air quality, energy consumption and the lifetime of the building envelope. We investigate the effect on moisture transfer in structures as a positive pressure is applied inside the enclosure. It is found that, contrary to established belief, the positive pressure does not induce any negative effects on the structures’ moisture content in normally ventilated classrooms, even with high occupancy. Our case study consists of a school building in Finland, subject to temperature and relative humidity measurements after a small (5–7 Pa) positive pressure was realized through ventilation control. We first address analytically the moisture excess generated inside the classrooms for 14 days, using dynamical balance equations that account for both ventilation effects and occupants’ moisture release in the environment. It is found that the average moisture excess is very small, largely below 1 g/m 3 , even for ventilation rates that are half the design value. We also examine the moisture performance of the envelope, by addressing the moisture migration at upper and lower joints of the external walls for both measured and design values of the indoor absolute humidity (AH). A coupled numerical model of diffusion and convection shows that moisture accumulation in the envelope and the according stresses are negligible for any realistic AH values. This result is in agreement with field measurements at the school. In conclusion, it seems that applying a small overpressure in a well-ventilated school building during a standard service period resulted in no accumulation inside the external walls, even at high occupancy and with low ventilation. Remarkably, it slightly dried out the moisture content in structures under actual occupancy conditions. The positive pressure has accordingly no negative effects on moisture performance, and is capable to guarantee a good indoor air quality as well.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)121-142
Number of pages22
JournalJournal of Building Physics
Volume43
Issue number2
Early online date2 Apr 2019
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Sept 2019
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

Keywords

  • indoor air quality
  • indoor air ventilation
  • Moisture performance
  • moisture transfer
  • positive pressure

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