Winter ventilation requirements

With less outside air entering buildings and lower levels of ventilation, it isn’t a surprise that indoor air quality is generally poorer during Winter months.

Stagnant air, humidity and levels of airborne pollutants can all rise in Winter, further contributing to the air quality you experience in your workspace. Which in turn impacts on the health and wellbeing of you, your colleagues and customers.

However, practical solutions and advice are available, helping you to make plans to improve the indoor working environment, throughout Winter and beyond.

Health & Safety Executive recommendations

The Health & Safety Executive provides case study examples of how organisations have improved the ventilation and fresh air supply in their offices, meeting rooms, production areas and even changing rooms.

Their suggestions are wide-ranging, from opening doors and windows, introducing air cleaning equipment to supplement existing air conditioning, through to installing mechanical ventilation systems.

Your risk assessment?

The starting point to help you determine the most appropriate ventilation solution for your workplace is a risk assessment, encompassing ways to monitor existing air quality, reviewing any existing air conditioning and/or ventilation systems you have, and additional ideas to improve fresh air and air movement in the workplace.

Your risk assessment might consider some of the following.

• Indoor Air quality monitors are commonplace and whilst they don’t solve poorly ventilated areas, they can help identify areas needing attention.
• For many, the simplest solution to improve ventilation is opening doors and windows, sometimes supplemented by fans to encourage air movement. However, this can impractical during colder months, or not an option at all, especially in airtight modern buildings, enclosed rooms, or sports halls.
• Air purification systems are designed to clean and filter harmful airborne dust, virus particles and pollutants. Air purifiers are popular as they can also work alongside existing air conditioning and ventilation systems, to supplement any fresh air/air movement within the building.
• In the absence of a fresh air supply, a more permanent solution is to install a mechanical ventilation system to increase fresh air ventilation. Systems can be used all year round, and with no open doors or windows, outdoor noise or pollution is not a factor. For larger buildings, specialist mechanical heat recovery ventilation (mhrv) systems can also heat the mechanically supplied fresh air supply, using heat recovered from the air extracted inside the building.

Call the experts

If you need assistance specifying any additional ventilation, air conditioning or air purification requirements for your workspace, don’t hesitate to contact Spheretech by emailing [email protected] or calling 01327 810 510.

For customers seeking new installations, we offer a free, no obligation survey to determine the appropriate solution for you.