Key facts

  • Funding Body/Client:  The Department for Communities and the Local Government (DCLG)
  • Project Partners:  AECOM, BSRIA 
  • Total Project Value: £234,000
  • UCL/IEDE Project Value Share: N/A
  • Duration: 2005-2008
  • Status:  Complete

The overall aims of this project are to establish the ventilation rates achieved in modern secondary schools in England or Wales built in compliance with DfES Building Bulletin 93 and to produce design guidance to assist architects and engineers to optimise the provision of ventilation in schools. These twin objectives have allowed us to obtain a snapshot of current performance in a small number of case studies and to develop design guidance for future schools.

Nine recently completed schools were monitored in detail for their indoor air quality, thermal comfort and acoustic performance all of which are affected by the ventilation systems. To derive the design guidance the results from the measurements in the schools have been used and then generalized using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). In this way, we aim to achieve a detailed understanding of the interaction between ventilation air and heat sources in naturally ventilated school classrooms.

PI: Tadj Oreszczyn

Co-Is: Michael Davies, Dejan Mumovic and Ian Ridley 

The following publications were produced as part of the work undertaken for this research project:

  • Mumovic, D., Palmer, J., Davies, Orme, M., Ridley, I., Oreszczyn, T., Judd, C., H.A. Medina, Pilmoor, G., Pearson, C., Critchlow, R., Way, P., (2009) Winter Indoor Air Quality, Thermal Comfort and Acoustic Performance of Newly Built Schools in England, Building and Environment; Volume 44, Issue 7, pp. 1466-1477
  • Mumovic, D., Davies, M., Ridley, I., Altamirano-Medina, H., Oreszczyn, T. (2009) A Methodology for Post-Occupancy Evaluation of Ventilation Rates in Schools, Building Services Engineering Research and Technology; Volume 30, No. 2, May 2009.
  • Mumovic, D., Palmer, J. (2009) Ventilation in Schools: An Integrated approach in Support of the UK Building Regulations, 11th International Conference on Air Distribution in Rooms – Roomvent 2009, May 2009, Busan, South Korea
  • Mumovic, D., Davies, M., Ridley, I., Altamirano-Medina, H., Oreszczyn, T. (2007) A comparative analysis of the indoor air quality and thermal comfort in schools with natural, hybrid and mechanical ventilation strategies, Well Being Indoors - CLIMA 2007, 10-14 June, Helsinki, Finland
  • Mumovic, D., Davies, M., Ridley, I., Altamirano-Medina, H., Oreszczyn, T. (2007) Carbon dioxide levels and dynamics in newly built schools in England, IAQVEC 2007, The 6th International Conference on Indoor Air Quality Ventilation and Energy Conservation, 28-31 October, Sendai, Japan 
  • Isanska-Cwiek, A., Palmer, J., Mumovic, D. (2009) Schools Design Guidance - Integrating Ventilation, Thermal Comfort and Daylight, CI 71/6/37 BD2505 ‘Ventilation in Schools’, DCLG, London 

The Final Report delivered for ODPM Building Regulations Division under the Building Operational Performance Framework 

For further information please contact: Dejan Mumovic