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Initial Release: December 12, 2023. Last Modified: 06/20/2024
This systems engineering analysis is constantly being updated. A suggested approach is to periodically visit this content and look for new date stamps in the TOC.
In 2006 Cassbeth began to investigate Global Warming and it was soon determined that the context diagram was too small and the system boundary was expanded to Sustainability, but the core of the sustainability work was always driven by the elephant in the room - Global Warming. Today the phrase is Climate Change and it suggests that the challenge is not only to reduce global warming but also to deal with the reality that the climate is changing and that change will cause system instability that must be addressed.
This research is broad and addresses Climate Change from a systems perspective but it quickly focused on Climate Action Plans because a serious systems issue surfaced that must be incorporated into all future plans.
A Climate Action Plan (CAP) is a document for measuring, tracking, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions and adopting climate adaptation measures. The documents are used to guide policy makers in addressing the impact of climate change in their communities. A CAP includes targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and detailed steps for meeting and tracking those targets. Plans also may include elements like resilience strategies and clean energy targets. The plans generally focus on implementing actions that will achieve emissions reductions in the most cost effective way possible. Building ventilation has a carbon footprint and we know from the COVID-19 disaster that poor building ventilation leads to respiratory infections that will kill or lead to lost health. This is a serious systems tradeoff challenge: Ventilation Carbon Footprint Vs. Health or Ventilation Carbon Footprint Vs. Climate Disasters. From a systems perspective, the goal is to reduce carbon footprint but not at the cost of lost health or epidemics. This is a serious situation and the current generation cannot ignore this connection.
Again, this research covers more than just the CAP challenges.
Systems Perspective
This analysis is coming from a systems perspective. Many associate the systems approach with engineering of large complex systems. Examples of large complex systems engineering from the previous century are the US Space Program, Air Defense, Air Traffic Control, etc. However, systems analysis is performed and used when addressing any complex problem that needs an effective solution. The following is offered as a definition of Systems Engineering from Systems Engineering Design:
Discipline that concentrates on the design and application of the whole (system) as distinct from the parts. It involves looking at a problem in its entirety, taking into account all the facets and all the variables and relating the social to the technical aspect.
In a systems analysis effort for a problem of this magnitude all alternatives are examined that may be able to address the need and provide a viable solution. This requires massive resources and in the past the US government and a handful of systems companies performed this type of systems analysis. This is called large complex systems analysis.
For the specialists that are working their respective areas, in a systems effort they are represented and sit at the systems engineering table. As they present their analysis findings their work informs other specialists in completely different analysis areas. It is this cross fertilization that allows all specialists to broaden their perspectives and enables them to detect new patterns in their own body of work, especially if they are stuck. Systems analysis is the mechanism that allows specialists to quickly and effectively communicate their findings to completely different areas and significantly shift the overall results in a positive direction. This systems analysis is offered in that spirit of an effective systems activity.
One of the key challenges in systems analysis is to determine the key needs, key analysis, key requirements, and key system architecture approaches that will solve the problem. This is very difficult because there is the important consideration to filter out the noise (irrelevant) while not losing what may be the answer. There is an old saying that practitioners use to communicate this challenge: We don't care about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin and we can't throw out the baby with the bathwater.
One of the important elements that the systems perspective provides is that it includes the human condition in the system. The system solution must include the reality that people are part of the system and that they do not behave rationally. So the system must account for irrational human behavior otherwise it will fail or have very poor performance characteristics. Without the systems perspective this is always lost. The purpose of all the systems analysis is to enable the development of potential architectures and solutions. Eventually the architecture(s) and solution(s) must be selected.
More information on the systems perspective for this problem is available as part of this systems engineering analysis at: Systems Perspective.
The following recommendations are coming from this systems analysis. The recommendations fall into the following categories:
Buildings and Energy
1. Climate Action Plans (CAP) should provide standalone ACH Level Requirements
A CAP needs to include carbon footprint impacts on ventilation performance levels to establish not only a low carbon footprint but also a healthy ventilation future everywhere. A CAP can no longer reference LEED (or ASHRAE non-hospital standards) for ventilation because the CDC guidance is now a minimum of 5 ACH in all rooms. LEED references ASHRAE non-hospital standards and both LEED and ASHRAE non-hospital standards do not provide the correct requirements so that designers, operators, and maintainers can ensure 5 ACH in all rooms. Add the following text to the CAP in the same place where LEED and or ASHRAE are referenced:
From a systems perspective, the goal is to reduce carbon footprint but not at the cost of lost health or epidemics. Based on this critical need all rooms in all buildings shall have a minimum of 5 Air Changes Per Hour (ACH) per the latest CDC guidelines in 2024.
2. Install a Building Automation System in Each Building (BAS)
The BAS system must support the following key ventilation requirements: kWh, CFM, ACH, cubic feet, and alarms and event logs. Once implemented, a BAS system when effectively managed can automate a manual Ventilation Quality Improvement Indicator (QII) program. The Ventilation QII program becomes a review of the BAS reports. It also may eliminate the need to measure ACH levels and develop a carbon footprint model because metered data becomes available that can be entered into Green House Gas reports. The challenge is that not all spaces may have BAS instrumentation.
3. Measure ACH levels in all Rooms in all Buildings
Measure the ventilation levels in all rooms in all buildings to determine the ACH level in each room. The ACH data will be used to respond to the new CAP goal of reducing carbon footprint while also ensuring minimum ACH levels are maintained. In order to get a reasonable handle on the ventilation performance levels in the various buildings, a site survey needs to be performed to document the ventilation ACH levels in all buildings. There is design and then there is reality. The reality is what matters and is affected by real world operations, maintenance, and unintended consequences.
4. Develop Carbon footprint and Ventilation Model
Develop a model that shows the relationship between carbon footprint and ventilation levels. Typically there is significant building carbon footprint data but there is no related ventilation performance levels data. The ventilation performance level data in terms of ACH is needed to ensure that the 5 ACH level is achieved. There should be a Course Grain Model at the building level and a Fine Grain Model at the Room level. The model should feed directly into a Green House Report that clearly shows the carbon footprint attributed to ventilation. The model is needed because it is difficult to measure the ventilation carbon footprint in large buildings with hundreds of fans and dampers.
5. Establish a Ventilation Quality Improvement Indicator (QII) Program
An independent Ventilation QII Program is needed to surface operations and maintenance issues. These issues exist and fall into 2 categories: (1) wasted energy or (2) poor ventilation causing respiratory infections. Without an independent Ventilation QII Program, empirical data suggests there will be rooms with ventilation levels below 5 ACH and there will be rooms above 6+ ACH that are using excessive carbon.
6. Purchase or Lease or Build Ceiling Level UV Systems
UV ventilation uses significantly less power than mechanical ventilation. The suggested approach is to start a demo project and followup with a pilot program before full rollout. The recommendations are based on getting the greatest airborne contagion mitigation benefit. For example, placing systems in personal offices will have minimal benefit because a personal office rarely will have multiple occupants while a public space will have many occupants and this will have massive benefit.
To reduce purchase costs consider buying the parts and assembling the systems using existing facilities staff. This approach might be as low as 10% of the capital costs. The turnkey products have significant markups because of little competition in what is still a small specialty market (hospitals, meat packing, etc).
The systems meet safety and OSHA requirements.
7. Purchase or Lease FAR UV Systems
UV ventilation uses significantly less power than mechanical ventilation. The suggested approach is to start a demo project and followup with a pilot program before full rollout. The recommendations are based on getting the greatest airborne contagion mitigation benefit. For example, placing systems in personal offices will have minimal benefit because a personal office rarely will have multiple occupants while a public space will have many occupants and this will have massive benefit.
The systems meet safety and OSHA requirements.
University Academics
1. Proposed new course: Facility Ventilation to Minimize Airborne Infection Risk and Carbon Footprint
Because of the COVID-19 disaster, we re-learned the importance of facility ventilation. Suddenly when dealing with climate change ventilation enters the systems solution space. From a systems perspective the goal is to reduce carbon footprint but not at the cost of lost health or epidemics. This is a serious systems tradeoff challenge: Ventilation Carbon Footprint Vs. Health or Ventilation Carbon Footprint Vs. Climate Disasters. There are no courses addressing the design of facility ventilation to address this important new challenge. There is a significant body of knowledge but it is not being taught at the university level.
2. Proposed new course: Psychology of Healthy Ventilation
Climate change and facility ventilation share the same characteristics of being distant, invisible, and seeming to not directly affect the individual. Climate change has massive evidence presented in the public media that something is happening. It is easy for people to see and process the images of the negative effects of climate change. Facility ventilation has massive scientific and empirical evidence but it is not in the public media. The only aspect that is in the public media is the COVID-19 disaster. Ventilation to minimize the risk of airborne contagions is not in the mass mind or in the people charged with designing, operating, and maintaining facilities. Ventilation is viewed only from the comfort level perspective of temperature and humidity.
University Applied Research
1. Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Quality Improvement Indicator Applied Research Project
There is a direct relationship between facility ventilation levels, risk of infection, and ventilation carbon footprint. With this intersection the following research project is proposed. The Ventilation and Carbon Footprint QII applied research project uses focus groups to develop effective QIIs that can be used in various facilities across the infrastructure to assess both ventilation and carbon footprints. This includes the development of an effective software platform to implement the QIIs. The software is a key element in implementing effective QIIs because of the amount of data that is collected in large facilities like a University.
2. Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Alarms System Applied Research Project
This applied research project will develop a system that allows users to understand their buildings ventilation and alert occupants to possible ventilation issues in the same way that carbon monoxide and smoke detectors alert occupants to carbon monoxide and fire hazards. There is a direct link between ventilation levels and carbon footprint. This system will report the carbon footprint associated with the realtime measurements of the ventilation levels. All status, control, and data is accessible via the Internet as part of the Internet of Things (IoT).
3. Realtime Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Quality Improvement Indicator Applied Research Project
This project will build on top of two other research projects: (1) Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Quality Improvement Indicator and (2) Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Alarms System. With the realtime sensors available realtime data will be collected and compared with the manual data collected with the Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Quality Improvement Indicator project. The project will instrument 30+ rooms. Based on the findings a mass production design of the External Ventilation Vents and Grills Measurement with Alarms device will be finalized.
4. Ventilation Test and Evaluation Applied Research Project
The purpose of the testing is to examine various virus mitigation approaches (mechanical, UV, ION, Natural, etc.) using operational room settings that physically represent the real world as closely as possible and quantify the results including the carbon footprint impacts.
K-12 Lesson Plans
This begs the question: should there be K-12 course content associated with Healthy Ventilation to teach this new generation what their grandparents knew after the flu epidemic at the start of the 20th century and should it be linked with existing climate change content? The suggestion is yes because healthy ventilation and climate change tools like reduced CO2 levels and technologies are linked. The following is a list of potential K-12 Ventilation Lesson Plans that can be applied in classroom settings and as part of STEM activities associated with ventilation.
1. SYSVE-101 Fresh Air. This lesson will introduce the students to air.
2. SYSVE-102 Anemometers. This lesson will introduce the students to anemometers.
3. SYSVE-103 Fresh Air Schools. This lesson will introduce the students to fresh air schools from the 1900s.
4. SYSVE-104 Natural Ventilation. This lesson will introduce the students to natural ventilation.
5. SYSVE-105 Measuring Mechanical Ventilation Rates. This lesson will introduce the students to mechanical ventilation and how mechanical ventilation works.
6. SYSVE-106 Capturing School Classroom ventilation data. The students will learn what to expect in terms of Air Changes Per Hour (ACH) from mechanical ventilation and how it can be measured.
7. SYSVE-107 Ventilation Approaches and Sustainability. This lesson will introduce the students to ventilation approaches and their impacts on carbon footprint.
Employee Training
1. Climate Action Plan (CAP) Facility Ventilation Carbon Footprint. Presentation
2. Building Ventilation What Everyone Should Know. Video
The following are key early organizations and documents:
The retreat of glaciers has been documented since 1850. Global warming appeared in a 1950 documentary film on Glacier Melting. It was observed using photographic history showing the same regions changing over time. The full breadth of the US Climate Change Technology Program (CCTP) Strategic Plan in 2006 is demonstrated by the number of US Government organizations that are listed as participants:
The above observation is important because the U.S. politics in 2006 was to subvert and negatively criticize the science. The documentary film, An Inconvenient Truth was released in 2006 where former Vice President Al Gore presented global warming findings and his personal experience of the family farm and how the farm needed to change, just like the world would need to change now that we have some insight into global warming.
The politics on global warming in the United States from the conservative right of the Republican party turned very ugly in 2006. This manifested itself in using very old and destructive techniques where basically in order to push an agenda all facts are discarded, obfuscated, or changed. This is described in Philosophy Professor Frankfurts' small book: On Bullshit [6]. Those that only push an agenda regardless of the consequences lie or bullshit. The other terms are propaganda and disinformation. They are all used to affect the mass mind and breakdown intelligent rational decision making. This behavior is the result of status quo self-interests that do not want to change because the change translates into massive shifts in capital.
As far as Global Warming and Climate Change, the shift has happened. There are new systems that have rolled out into the infrastructure to help reduce the overall carbon footprint of the planet. It happened regardless of the destructive rhetoric to stop it because we live in a natural system, the world. Like all systems it seeks stability. The issue is how long will it take for the system to become stable after a destabilizing event - a year, a decade, a life time, or multiple life times. The argument in 2023 from climatologists is that it may be too little and too late. Change is coming and we will have to deal with it.
This research will follow the approach established by the COVID-19 Research From A Systems Perspective. This was a huge effort with the research captured in the Project - Return to Life sections Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and a book that is mostly Part 1 [7]. This research led to various Cassbeth products to address the ventilation issues surfaced by the research. This research on climate change will be informed by the ventilation research. From a systems perspective, the goal is to reduce carbon footprint but not at the cost of lost health or epidemics. This is a serious connection and the current generation cannot ignore this connection.
All the Cassbeth ventilation products that surfaced from the COVID-19 research fall into the category of measuring and disclosing ventilation rates. They exist, but they are a market failure. Fixing ventilation like global warming and climate change, although a simple problem unlike climate change, is being rejected by the status quo [8]. It is horrifying to see this rejection but this is where we are as a people and this is a key research finding from the COVID-19 Research From a Aystems Perspective. As far as the Cassbeth ventilation measurement and disclosure products, the goal is to eventually have them not only report Air Changes Per Hour (ACH) but now also report Carbon Footprint levels.
Use the table of contents to navigate. This analysis is constantly being updated and follows the natural flow of all systems engineering efforts; some analysis is a dead end and is abandoned, some analysis converges, some analysis diverges, and some analysis stays at a steady state level until new information surfaces, typically from a specialist on the team.
References
[1] Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), 2006. https://models.pbl.nl/image/index.php/IPCC,_2006
[2] GREEN PAPER A European Strategy for Sustainable, Competitive and Secure Energy, COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES, Brussels, 8.3.2006. https://europa.eu/documents/comm/green_papers/pdf/com2006_105_en.pdf
[3] Stern Review: The Economics of Climate Change, 30 October 2006, release by Her Majesty’s Treasury of the UK Government. Published in January 2007 by Cambridge University Press. https://biotech.law.lsu.edu/blog/sternreview_report_complete.pdf
[4] U.S. Climate Change Technology Program STRATEGIC PLAN, U.S. Department of Energy (Lead-Agency), September 2006. https://downloads.globalchange.gov/cctp/CCTP-StratPlan-Sep-2006.pdf
[5] Quadrennial Defense Review Report, U.S. DOD, February 2010. https://dod.defense.gov/Portals/1/features/defenseReviews/QDR/QDR_as_of_29JAN10_1600.pdf
[6] On Bullshit Hardcover, Harry G. Frankfurt, Princeton University Press, ISBN: 978-0691122946, January 30, 2005.
[7] COVID-19 A Systems Perspective, Walter Sobkiw, 2021, ISBN 9780983253044, hardback.
[8] VENTILATION: WHY does no one take it seriously? Jan Sundell, Former Editor-in-Chief of Indoor Air. February 17, 2019, Published online 2021 Apr 20. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8251269
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
Why the IPCC was created
Human activities now occur on a scale that is starting to interfere with natural systems such as the global climate. Because climate change is such a complex and challenging issue, policy makers need an objective source of information about the causes of climate change, its potential environmental and socio-economic impacts, and possible response options.
Recognizing this, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) established the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 1988. The Panels' role is to assess on a comprehensive, objective, open and transparent basis the best available scientific, technical and socio-economic information on climate change from around the world. The assessments are based on information contained in peer reviewed literature and, where appropriately documented, in industry literature and traditional practices. They draw on the work of hundreds of experts from all regions of the world. IPCC reports seek to ensure a balanced reporting of existing viewpoints and to be policy relevant but not policy prescriptive. Since its establishment the IPCC has produced a series of publications, which have become standard works of reference, widely used by policy makers, scientists, other experts and students. [1].
[1] The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Why the IPCC was created, December 2004. http://energyeficiency.clima.md/files/1_Cadrul_International/2_Documente/8_IPCC/Eng/IPCC_Introduction.pdf, 2023.
In 2021, the U.S Federal Government released the details of climate adaptation plans developed by 23 federal agencies. The plans were released as a part of President Biden’s effort to make the federal government more adaptive to the accelerating impacts of climate change. The agencies releasing Climate Adaptation and Resilience Plans are:
All plans are available at www.sustainability.gov/adaptation. [1]
A climate action plan is a document for measuring, tracking, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions and adopting climate adaptation measures. The documents are used to guide policy makers in addressing the impact of climate change in their communities. Climate action plans include targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and detailed steps for meeting and tracking those targets. Plans also may include elements like resilience strategies and clean energy targets. The plans generally focus on implementing actions that will achieve emissions reductions in the most cost effective way possible. [2]
References
[1] Press Release. FACT SHEET: Biden Administration Releases Agency Climate Adaptation and Resilience Plans from Across Federal Government, October 07, 2021.
[2] What is a Climate Action Plan? https://climatecheck.com/risks/mitigation/what-is-a-climate-action-plan, 2023.
As of 2023 there are a large number of Climate Action Plans that are available for review. The following is a small sampling of the plans:
The Climate Action Plans were reviewed from the facility ventilation perspective. Before the review is offered, the following is a quick summary of facility ventilation.
[Presentation . Building Ventilation Video]
Ventilation what is it?
It is about Ventilation performance levels. Ventilation performance is measured as: Air Changes Per Hour (ACH). ACH is a measure of how often air changes in a room. For example 1 ACH changes the room air 1 time per hour, 20 ACH changes the room air 20 times per hour, or every 3 minutes (60 min / 3 min = 20 ACH). Disease specialists address ventilation only in ACH. ACH = Fan Cubic-feet per Hour / Room Cubic-feet.
It is not about measuring and maintaining CO2 levels. Maintaining CO2 levels leads to a system with ACH levels that are too low such as 1 ACH or less. It is not about liters/min or cubic-feet/min per person, this will never provide visibility into the actual ACH level in a room and when scenarios are run the ACH levels are too low such as 1 ACH or less. Ventilation performance when dealing with airborne contagions is always in terms of ACH in a real room setting, not a lab or test fixture. Example: 60 min / air changed every 3 min = 20 ACH.
What should be the ACH
Level?
An ACH level of 0 leads to infection. An ACH level of 1 leads to infection we know from data. The CDC recommends 12 ACH for a hospital room with airborne contagion. The number must be greater than 1. As ACH increases the risk of infection drops.
Many address ACH levels as a percent of remaining contagions after 1 ACH. One air change removes approximately 63% of room air contaminants, and a second air change removes about 63% of what remains, and so on. Systems engineering safety and reliability analysis is about probabilities, relative probabilities and time before failure. Applying systems engineering safety and reliability concepts to ACH provides a quick view on the effectiveness of ACH levels and how one can behave.
Jump to research area: What Should Be The ACH Levels
Where do ACH standards
and guidelines come from?
ASHRAE American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers, CDC Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, DOD Department of Defense Standards, ISO International Organization for Standardization, and Others. Most of the ACH levels are based on comfort levels except for when airborne contagion mitigation is required in hospitals.
What have facility managers
done?
The Hawaiian airlines ventilation performance level is 20 ACH and they posted it for all passengers to see on their entertainment screens. The Philadelphia restaurant program is 15 ACH and 106 restaurants participated. The Philadelphia school district determined the ventilation rate in each room in all their schools and posted the data online, 234 schools 12,000+ rooms. New York and Boston school districts did spot checks and posted their data online.
Climate Action Plans - Ventilation
The existing plans reference the LEED standard for compliance and are silent on ventilation. The LEED ventilation requirements reference ASHRAE Standard 62.1 [1].
ASHRAE Standard 62.1 is based on comfort levels using CFM per person rates and when the calculations are performed the ACH levels can be 1 ACH or less. They are also inconsistent because the numbers vary between different room types and occupancy levels. As a result the Climate Action Plans cannot reference the LEED standard for ventilation requirements after the COVID-19 disaster. The Climate Action Plans need a separate ventilation reference.
ASHRAE Standard 170-2017 for Health Care Facilities has ACH levels but it is for healthcare facilities. In 2023 ASHRAE released Standard 241P, Control of Infectious Aerosols but it uses ASHRAE Standard 62.1 as the model (CFM per person / occupancy) and it does not provide ACH levels. Once the numbers are calculated the ACH levels in ASHRAE Standard 241P can be less than 1 ACH. Also the numbers vary between room types.
It is clear that future Climate Action Plans cannot reference ASHRAE or LEED standards going forward for ventilation performance levels. The numbers do not reflect what is needed for healthy infrastructure. The only reasonable alternatives are to use CDC guidelines and sources that have specifically made a study of airborne infection risk as a function of ventilation levels. Future Climate Action plans should reference the CDC guidelines and provide the following ventilation requirements:
A key element of systems practices is ensuring that requirements are:
The reality is that the ventilation requirements coming from ASHRAE and LEED are inconsistent, not clear, not standalone, and thus not testable. Basically engineers are left to their own interpretations as driven by external forces. That is why when ACH levels are researched the numbers vary wildly between various sources.
The CDC guideline of 5 ACH for all rooms, is consistent, clear, standalone, and testable. Engineers can design to this requirement and not be compromised by external forces that seek to just reduce costs.
The reality is that there will be elite facilities that will exceed any ventilation requirements to ensure the highest level of performance. The challenge is for the non elite facilities. They must not be allowed to drop their ventilation performance levels to such a low level that health is compromised and they become sources of massive airborne infections. [Presentation . Building Ventilation Video]
For more information about ACH levels and risk of infections from the COVID-19 Research From A Systems Perspective see: What Should Be The ACH Levels. A deep dive can be done at this link to see the full COVID-19 Research From A Systems Perspective.
References
[1] ANSI/ASHRAE Addendum p to ANSI/ASHRAE Standard 62.1 Ventilation for Acceptable Indoor Air Quality. https://www.ashrae.org/file%20library/technical%20resources/standards%20and%20guidelines/standards%20addenda/62_1_2013_p_20150707.pdf, (only old versions are available online), 2023.
[2] Improving Ventilation In Buildings, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention - CDC, Updated May 11, 2023, Updated May 12, 2023. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/improving-ventilation-in-buildings.html, https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/ventilation.html, 2023.
[3] 5-step guide to checking ventilation rates in classrooms, T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Schools for Health, Harvard Healthy Buildings program. 2020. https://schools.forhealth.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2020/08/Harvard-Healthy-Buildings-program-How-to-assess-classroom-ventilation-08-28-2020.pdf, 2023.
[4] Guidelines for Environmental Infection Control in Health-Care Facilities (2003), Centers For Disease Control and Prevention - CDC. https://www.cdc.gov/infectioncontrol/guidelines/environmental/appendix/air.html, https://www.cdc.gov/infection-control/hcp/environmental-control/appendix-b-air.html, https://www.cdc.gov/infection-control/hcp/environmental-control/appendix-b-air.html?CDC_AAref_Val=https://www.cdc.gov/infectioncontrol/guidelines/environmental/appendix/air.html, 2023.
At the height of the COVID-19 disaster a key document from the World Health Organization (WHO) was on natural ventilation [1]. The document addressed Airborne Transmission and Air Changes per Hour (ACH) or what is now called colloquially Ventilation. The term Ventilation was used by this systems research: COVID-19 A Systems Perspective [2] and it was meant to convey the importance in non-technical terms ventilation levels within buildings.
In November 2021 the WHO assembled a group of experts to update its formal guidelines for classifying the different routes that pathogens take from one person to another. In 2024 the group published a report outlining a new set of definitions that more accurately reflect the state of the science of disease transmission. The transmission routes are divided into:
(1) Direct contact through touching infected surfaces or other people and
(2) Involve the air.
The through the air transmission route is further subdivided into:
(1) Direct deposition, which refers to larger particles that strike the mucus membranes of the eyes, nose, or mouth and
(2) Airborne transmission / inhalation, in which smaller particles are inhaled into the lungs.
The guidelines don’t rely on droplet size or distance spread. The changes will have consequences for how countries set infection control standards and prevention measures going forward. [2]
The following are some extracts from an article in STAT that covered the new WHO report [3]:
The WHO report: Global technical consultation report on proposed terminology for pathogens that transmit through the air, has now defined airborne transmission / inhalation, in which smaller particles are inhaled into the lungs. [2] The WHO report: Natural Ventilation for Infection Control in Health-Care Settings, has stated an airborne precaution room is a room with >12 air changes per hour (ACH). [1] The WHO guideline of 12+ ACH is greater than the CDC 2024 guideline to aim for 5+ ACH in all rooms.
The climate change take away:
References
[1] WHO Publication/Guidelines Natural Ventilation for Infection Control in Health-Care Settings, World Health Organization (WHO), 2009. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK143284/pdf/Bookshelf_NBK143284.pdf, 2024.
[2] Global technical consultation report on proposed terminology for pathogens that transmit through the air, World Health Organization (WHO), 2024. https://iris.who.int/bitstream/handle/10665/376496/9789240089181-eng.pdf, 2024.
[3] Covid ignited a global controversy over what is an airborne disease. The WHO just expanded its definition, STAT, April 18, 2024. https://www.statnews.com/2024/04/18/covid-airborne-transmission-disease-who-expanded-definition.
[4] COVID-19 A Systems Perspective, Walter Sobkiw, 2021, ISBN 9780983253044, hardback.
Climate Action Plan Ventilation Requirements
Until now the Climate Action Plans have not made the connection between facility ventilation and reduced carbon footprints associated with facility ventilation. The COVID-19 disaster showed the importance of facility ventilation and that it cannot be removed from the planning efforts. Just like there are targets for energy use and carbon footprints there needs to be targets for ventilation levels. [Presentation]
The proposed targets for ventilation levels are in terms of Air Changes Per Hour (ACH). The ACH levels are a result if the COVID-19 Research from a Systems Perspective and they are:
Year 1: 5 ACH (CDC Guideline
for all facilities)
Year 2: 6 ACH (Harvard T.H.
Chan 5-step guide to checking school ventilation)
Year 5: 12+ ACH (CDC Guideline
for room airborne infections)
ACH = Mechanical ACH + UV
eACH + Other oACH
The goal is to establish an ACH quality improvement program so that there is always movement towards more healthy facilities.
The COVID-19 and seasonal flu research suggests that current facilities make people sick and some die, even with the availability of vaccines. This is a serious systems tradeoff challenge: Ventilation Carbon Footprint Vs. Health or Ventilation Carbon Footprint Vs. Climate Disasters. This like the COVID-19 disaster is big science and big engineering. Fortunately it is relatively easy to determine the carbon footprint from facility ventilation and this can be compared with the overall carbon footprint generated from all other human activities in settings like: Schools, Universities, Towns, Countries, etc.
Any Climate Action Plan (CAP) should include carbon footprint impacts on ventilation performance levels and help establish a sustainable and healthy ventilation future everywhere. The suggested approach is to gather data and develop a model as follows:
Determine existing ventilation
performance levels
Prepare a Ventilation Quality
Improvement Indicator (QII) to independently gather data
Have room attendants
independently gather data per the QII to validate any existing data
Feed data into spreadsheets
/ database / online portal (software exists for online entries)
Develop a model to perform
what-if analysis (prototype exists)
There is an example site survey of all classrooms in all schools in Philadelphia :234 schools, 12,000+ rooms [1]. New York and Boston performed spot checks of their schools.
Systems Assessment: A CAP needs to include carbon footprint impacts on ventilation performance levels to establish not only a low carbon footprint but also a healthy ventilation future everywhere. A CAP can no longer reference LEED for ventilation because the CDC guidance is now a minimum of 5 ACH in all rooms. LEED does not provide the correct requirements so that designers, operators, and maintainers can ensure 5 ACH. Add the following text to the CAP in the same place where LEED is referenced: From a systems perspective, the goal is to reduce carbon footprint but not at the cost of lost health or epidemics. Based on this critical need all rooms in all buildings shall have a minimum of 5 Air Changes Per Hour (ACH) per the latest CDC guidelines in 2024. [2]
References
[1] Philadelphia School District Ventilation Site Survey, https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/18Kn2h5zS6ivX27-msM2Pdy10HUUWaUAomAaXJJ2FK7w/edit.
[2] Improving Ventilation In Buildings, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention - CDC, Updated May 11, 2023. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/improving-ventilation-in-buildings.html, 2023.
When dealing with Buildings and Energy to minimize carbon footprints, there are challenges because of limited budgets, insufficient staff, and a culture that is frozen in a status quo. They are responding to complaints that are translated to open tickets that must be closed and system failures that must be repaired leaving little resources to investigate and move out on - a program of Ventilation to Minimize Carbon Footprint and Airborne Infection Risk.
The current approach to reporting Building Energy carbon footprints is to examine metered data. However, the metered data does not provide the needed visibility into the system so that future changes can be fully understood and implemented. Gathering the data to provide full system visibility for large facilities and campuses is typically not performed because it is not a priority and there are no budgets to allow for these types of site surveys. Once a decision is made to perform a full Building(s) and Energy site survey the following data should be collected:
General Data [1] [2]
Lighting in each room / space
Ventilation in each room / space [1] [2]
Building Automation Systems (BAS)
Fixed Equipment (e.g. test, diagnostic, manufacturing, scientific equipment, like computers, drill presses, etc.)
The site survey is not complete until every single room and space is accounted for and all the above data is entered into a database and or spreadsheet. This is a huge effort for large facilities and campuses. It cannot be taken lightly and it cannot be treated as an unimportant activity because bad data is worse than no data.
Understanding all systems starts with a site survey to identify what exists. With this data effective planning can be performed. For example, if only 10% of rooms / spaces are controlled by an automation system while 50% have been upgraded with low power LED lights, it may be more effective to move out with more room / space automation coverage even though the costs might be higher than moving out with more LED lighting coverage. This decision can be determined by using a systems engineering tradeoff based on the Measure of Effectiveness (MOE) [3]. The following is a notional example:
Tradeoff Criteria (higher is better) |
LED |
BAS |
LED |
BAS |
LED |
BAS |
||
| Carbon Footprint Reduction | 2% |
10% |
2% |
10% |
- |
- |
||
| Installation Simplicity | - |
- |
3 |
2 |
3 |
2 |
||
| Maintenance | - |
- |
1 |
3 |
1 |
3 |
||
| Public perception | - |
- |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
||
| Improved Ventilation | - |
- |
- |
2 |
- |
- |
||
| Improved Lighting | - |
- |
0 |
- |
0 |
- |
||
Total Tradeoff Rating |
2 |
10 |
7 |
18 |
6 |
6 |
||
Total Cost (normalized) |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
||
MOE (higher is better) |
2 |
5 |
7 |
9 |
6 |
3 |
Note: MOE = Total Tradeoff Rating / Total Cost, this is the benefit for each dollar spent. [3]
The tradeoff suggests that even though the BAS is more costly, the approach to move out with the BAS is more effective because there is more benefit for each dollar spent. If the Carbon Footprint Reduction and Improved Ventilation criteria are removed then the LED upgrade becomes more effective. Without this tradeoff the lowest cost approach will always be selected and the least effective carbon footprint system will be installed.
As part of any sustainability activity a full Building(s) and Energy site survey should be performed and once a baseline is established it needs to be maintained. Otherwise the system will not be optimized and suggestions and upgrades will have little basis in actual data and will be driven just by strong personalities that may make the wrong decisions. Gathering all the data is the systems approach used in systems engineering to ensure that there is a systems perspective of the challenges and the potential solutions. Effective site surveys are always step A when dealing with any system.
References
[2] COVID-19 A Systems Perspective, Walter Sobkiw, 2021, ISBN 9780983253044, hardback.
[3] Systems Practices As Common Sense, Walter Sobkiw, ISBN: 978-0983253082, first edition 2011, ISBN: 978-0983253051, second edition 2020.
There are many domestic and international building rating systems associated with green practices and air quality. The following is a brief list:
Green [1] [2] [3]
Green building certifications and standards assess buildings for their design, construction, operation, and maintenance practices. Buildings are assessed across several sustainability categories like material selection, water conservation, energy efficiency, indoor environmental quality, and site development. Some certification programs use a points based a rating system and recognize buildings for reaching different levels of sustainability. Other programs offer a single certification if a building earns a certain number of points.
Air Quality [1] [2] [3] [4]
There are no rating systems associated with healthy ventilation other than the system offered by this research. There are guidelines from the CDC [5] and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health: Schools for Health: 5-step guide to checking ventilation rates in classrooms [6]. There is also the Philadelphia Restaurant program that was developed during the COVID-19 disaster.
Healthy Ventilation
Companies
The following guidance and rating systems can be used in Climate Action Plans (CAP) to provide reasonable goals and measurements of progress towards reducing facility carbon footprints. One system also includes the importance of facility ventilation and that there must be healthy ventilation while also minimizing the ventilation carbon footprint. They are:
According to the CDC there were 75,466 COVID-19 U.S. deaths in 2023. [8]
The CDC states - COVID-19 spreads when an infected person breathes out droplets and very small particles that contain the virus. These droplets and particles can be breathed in by other people or land on their eyes, noses, or mouth. In some circumstances, they may contaminate surfaces they touch. [9]
Effective May 1, 2024, hospitals are no longer required to report COVID-19 hospital admissions, hospital capacity, or hospital occupancy data to HHS through CDC’s National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN). CDC encourages ongoing, voluntary reporting of hospitalization data. Data voluntarily reported to NHSN after May 1, 2024, is available at Trends in Hospital Utilization, Capacity, and Reporting - NHSN. [10]
While some may view 75,466 COVID-19 deaths as good news once compared to prior years, this is still a terrible disaster because we know that many of these deaths are traceable to poor ventilation. We also know that there are other respiratory diseases that lead to hospitalizations and deaths. [11]
STARS: The Sustainability Tracking Assessment & Rating System
(STARS) is a transparent, self-reporting framework for colleges and
universities to measure their sustainability performance. It is intended
to engage and recognize the full spectrum of higher education institutions,
from community colleges to research universities. It encompasses long-term
sustainability goals for already high-achieving institutions, as well as
entry points of recognition for institutions that are taking first steps
toward sustainability.
Energy Star Rating System: The Energy Star Rating System is a standardized
rating system and label that helps developers and consumers identify energy
efficient appliances, electronics, heating and cooling systems, lighting,
and commercial equipment. The Energy Star program also assesses buildings
for their energy performance, and certified buildings must earn an Energy
Star score of 75 or higher on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) 1
to 100 scale. In Canada, Energy Star Certification is overseen by Natural
Resources Canada (NRCan). Certification is annual and must be verified by
a third-party.
Started in 1992, ENERGY STAR is a government-backed program providing tools
and resources to promote energy efficiency. In addition to providing the
ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager®, they offer several opportunities to earn
recognition for energy efficiency: certification for existing buildings or
plants, "Designed to ENERGY STAR" for new commercial construction, portfolio-wide
recognition, and organizational awards.
LEED: Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, also known as LEED,
was created in 1998 by the U.S. Green Building Council in response to growing
climate change concerns. Now, it’s the most widely used green building
rating system in the world. It provides builders with a practical framework
for creating healthy, highly efficient, and cost-saving green buildings.
A building or project earns LEED credits by addressing areas like carbon,
energy, water, waste, materials, and indoor environmental quality. There
are currently nine LEED categories: Sustainable Sites, Water Efficiency,
Energy and Atmosphere, Materials and Resources, Indoor Environmental Quality,
Innovation in Design, Regional Priority, Integrative Process, and Location
and Transportation. Within each of these nine categories are specific credits
that builders can earn to become LEED certified, and credits earn you points,
which then determines the level of LEED certification your building achieves.
There are currently four levels of LEED certification: Certified, Silver,
Gold, and Platinum.
LEED is a green building certification used in the United States. Managed
by the U.S. Green Building Council, this building rating system is completed
by on-site or third-party verification. Many building types can apply for
this certification program, including new construction, existing buildings,
homes, and communities. LEED has four certification levels including, certified,
silver, gold, and platinum. LEED has nine areas of focus, including location
and transportation, sustainable sites, water efficiency, energy and atmosphere,
material and resources, indoor environmental quality, innovation, regional
priority, and integrative processes. The LEED certification program aims
to have buildings use their resources more efficiently and create a safe
environment for all its occupants throughout the building’s life cycle.
As of 2019, 80,000 projects were registered, with 32,500 projects having
completed the certification process.
BREEAM: Building Research Establishment's Environmental Assessment Method
was developed in the United Kingdom by the Building Research Establishment
in 1990 and is now recognized internationally. BREEAM evaluates the
sustainability performance of buildings across several categories - including
management, health and wellbeing, energy, transport, water, materials, waste,
land use and ecology, and pollution - to help achieve Environmental, Social,
and Governance (ESG), health, and net zero goals. A building earns points
across each category, and a building can achieve one of five certification
levels depending on its overall score: Pass, Good, Very Good, Excellent,
or Outstanding.
Launched in the UK in 1990 and predominantly used across Europe, BREEAM is
an environmental assessment method and rating system for buildings, which
has become one of the most comprehensive and widely recognized measures of
a building’s environmental performance. It encourages designers, clients
and others to think about low carbon and low impact design, minimizing the
energy demands created by a building before considering energy efficiency
and low carbon technologies.
BREEM is the oldest green building rating system. It has since certified
projects in over 50 countries, has over 560,000 certified projects, and over
2 million registered. This green building rating system is measured across
9 categories: management, health and well-being, transport, water, materials,
land use and ecology, and pollution. BREEAM is aimed at making buildings
more sustainable, as well as improving building performance and efficiency.
Many other green building certification programs, including Green Globes,
were inspired by the ideas and innovations of BREEAM.
Green Globes: Green Globes is an online assessment protocol and rating
system that evaluates the environmental sustainability, health and wellness,
and resilience of commercial real estate. Developed by the Green Building
Initiative (GBI), Green Globes awards up to 1,000 points across seven categories,
including indoor environment, resources, energy, project management, space
and amenities, water, and emissions. Green Globes certification levels range
from one to five globes, with five globes being the highest level.
Green Globes is an online green building rating and certification tool that
is used primarily in Canada and the USA. Green Globes was developed by ECD
Energy and Environment Canada, an arms-length division of JLL. Green Globes
is licensed for use by BOMA Canada (Existing Buildings) and the Green Building
Initiative in the USA (New and Existing Buildings). Examples of our Green
Globes projects include: ASU Walter Cronkite School of Journalism, Phoenix,
AZ, USA, and Advanced Technology Research Facility, Federick, MD, USA.
Green Globes is used in the US and Canada. Green Globes is structured so
that it can be done as a self-assessment in-house with the project manager
and design team. It uses a questionnaire that is aimed at helping the user
make changes to complete the certification. Like FitWel, there are no
prerequisites to complete this certification. Like LEED, Green Globes has
four levels of certification. Green Globes can be used in new construction,
existing buildings, and commercial interiors. This certification program
focuses on energy usage, water, waste management, emissions, indoor environment,
and environmental management.
LBC: The Living Building Challenge was created by the International Living
Future Institute (ILFI) and provides a framework for regenerative design
and self sustaining buildings. Regenerative design ensures buildings not
only have a minimal environmental impact but also have a positive effect
on surrounding natural systems. The program has a series of performance based
requirements that address seven performance areas: Place, Water, Energy,
Health and Happiness, Materials, Equity, and Beauty. To achieve LBC
certification, a project must demonstrate its compliance across all seven
categories for at least 12 consecutive months.
NGBS: The National Green Building Standard is a residentially focused green
building certification program that was developed by the National Association
of Home Builders (NAHB) in collaboration with the International Code Council
(ICC). NGBS provides guidelines and criteria for the design, construction,
and operation of sustainable single-family homes, multi-family buildings,
and residential developments in the U.S. Performance is measured across six
categories: Lot Design and Development, Resource Efficiency, Water Efficiency,
Energy Efficiency, Indoor Environmental Quality, and Building Operation and
Maintenance. There are four different levels of NGBS certification that are
awarded based on the number of points achieved: Bronze, Silver, Gold, or
Emerald.
SITES: The Sustainable Sites Initiative, also known as SITES, is a framework
and certification program for the design, development, and management of
sustainable landscapes and outdoor spaces. This program applies to a variety
of project types, including open spaces (like national parks and botanic
gardens), streetscapes and plazas (like transportation hubs), commercial
properties (like retail and office areas), residential neighborhoods, and
educational or institutional properties (like college campuses, museums,
and hospitals). SITES certified projects help reduce water demand, filter
and reduce stormwater runoff, enhance biodiversity, provide pollinator and
wildlife habitat, reduce energy consumption, improve air quality, improve
human health, increase outdoor recreation opportunities, and much more. The
SITES rating system is a 200-point system, and projects can obtain SITES
certification at one of four levels: Certified, Silver, Gold, or Platinum.
The rating system is designed to distinguish sustainable landscapes, measure
their performance and elevate their value. SITES certification is for development
projects located on sites with or without buildings - ranging from national
parks to corporate campuses, streetscapes to homes, and more. Launched in
2006, SITEs was developed by the American Society of Landscape Architects
(ASLA), the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center at The University of Texas
at Austin and the United States Botanic Garden.
DGNB: A green building certification program created by the German
Sustainable Building Council, focuses on promoting sustainable building practices
across Europe. DGNB uses a holistic approach with an emphasis on performance.
This green building rating system has three levels of certification, platinum,
gold, and silver. For this certification program, buildings are evaluated
on ecological quality, socio-cultural and function quality, technical quality,
and process quality. As of December 2018, over 4800 buildings have eared
a DGNB certification.
Greern Star: Based in Australia since 2003, Green Star is a comprehensive,
national, voluntary environmental rating system that evaluates the environmental
design and construction of buildings and communities. Green Star was developed
by the Green Building Council Australia, whose objective is to promote
sustainable development and the transition of the property industry by promoting
green building programs, technologies, design practices and operations. Green
Star has established individual environmental measurement criteria with
particular relevance to the Australian marketplace and environmental context.
Green Star is an international sustainability reporting and rating
system, that is popular particularly in Australia and South Africa.
All Green Star categories include an innovation category that rewards projects
for creating and utilizing new approaches to sustainability. Like the other
certification programs on this list, Green Star can be used in a variety
of building types and is assessed in categories such as indoor environmental
air quality, energy, transportation, water, materials, land use and ecology,
and emissions. The main goal of Green Star is to guide project teams to make
conscious decisions regarding energy usage and material selection. As of
2019, over 1450 projects had completed the Green Star certification.
BCA Green Mark Scheme: Building and Construction Authority Green Mark Scheme
is a green certification program that focuses on the development of sustainable
buildings in Singapore. This certification program focuses on innovation
and governance to create a community of care and a more sustainable environment.
BCA Green Mark Scheme has 5 key attributes: energy efficiency, water efficiency,
environmental protection, indoor environmental quality, and innovation features.
Since its launch in January of 2005, BCA Green Mark Scheme has certified
over 1700 buildings.
BEAM PLUS: BEAM PLUS is a certification program recognized by the Hong
Kong Business Environment Council that focuses on incorporating
sustainability into planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance
of a building. BEAM PLUS has five focuses for assessment: site, material,
water and energy use, indoor environmental quality, and innovation. The BEAM
PLUS certification program has a goal of educating the community about
sustainability and sustainable practices and has intentions to extend BEAM
PLUS beyond Hong Kong.
CASBEE: Comprehensive Assessment System for Build Energy Environment Efficiency,
was launched in 2015 and can be used for both new construction and existing
buildings throughout Japan. Starting in 2005, earning a CASBEE
certification became mandatory in 24 Japanese municipalities. CASBEE moved
internationally in 2014 when a building in Tianjin, China earned
their CASBEE certification. This program focuses on energy and resource
efficiency, and local and indoor environments. CASBEE was designed to reduce
the life cycle of resource use, as well as improve quality of life for building
occupants and the surrounding community.
GORD: Gulf Organization for Research and Development, aims to encourage
sustainable economic development and environmental leadership through sustainable
building design. GORD is the first performance based green building certification
program in the Middle East and North Africa. This
certification has two stages: (1) obtain the design and build certificate
following design phase and, (2) pursue the conformance design audit. Since
its launch in 2007, over 100 million square feet of building space have received
GORD certification.
Miljöbyggnad: Miljöbyggnad, or Environmental Building in English,
is a green building certification program created by the Sweden Green
Building Council in 2010. Including both new construction and existing building
pathways, buildings can earn gold, silver, or bronze certification levels.
Interesting, since water usage is not a threatened resource in Sweden, there
is no section regarding water efficiency. However, this program focuses on
indoor environmental quality, energy use, and material use. Miljöbyggnad
uses principles from LEED and BREEAM to develop its certification attributes.
Thus far, over 1000 buildings have received Miljöbyggnad
certification.
NABERS: A national rating system that measures the environmental performance
of Australian buildings. The rating system, launched in 1998, measures
the energy efficiency, water usage, waste management and indoor environment
quality of a building or tenancy and its impact on the environment.
CEEQUAL: An international evidence-based sustainability assessment
and rating system for civil engineering, infrastructure, landscaping and
public realm projects. Launched in 2003 in the UK, and available
internationally since 2011, the rating system is predominantly used in Europe.
CEEQUAL became part of the BRE Group in 2015, and is now being operated in
conjunction with BREEAM.
Envision: Launched in 2012, Envision is a planning and design guidance tool
that provides industry-wide sustainability metrics for all infrastructure
types. The rating system evaluates, grades and gives recognition to
infrastructure projects that use transformational, collaborative approaches
to assess the sustainability indicators over the course of the project’s
life cycle. Launched in 2012, the tool was created by a strategic alliance
of the Zofnass Program for Sustainable Infrastructure at the Harvard
University Graduate School of Design and the Institute for Sustainable
Infrastructure (ISI). Examples of our Envision projects include: Holland
Energy Park, Holland, MI, USA; Kansas City Streetcar, Kansas City, MO, USA;
Historic Fourth Ward Park, Atlanta, GA, USA; I-4 Ultimate Highway Project,
Orlando, FL, USA.
EDGE: Excellence in Design for Greater Efficiencies is a green building certification system focused on making buildings in emerging markets more resource efficient. Launched in 2013, the program offers free web-based software to help design teams and project owners assess cost effective ways to incorporate energy and water saving options into their buildings.
Air Quality Certification Programs
BREEAM: See Green Certification Programs.
GreenGuard: GreenGuard certified products contribute to certification across
several of the previously mentioned programs, including BREEAM, LEED, and
Fitwel. GreenGuard certifies building materials and products like furniture,
paints, adhesives, and cleaning products that have low levels of volatile
organic compound (VOC) emissions. High levels of VOCs can contribute to poor
indoor air quality, which can have serious impacts on human health. By selecting
products with GreenGuard certification, architects, developers, and building
owners can create healthier indoor environments, which then contributes to
other green building certifications.
Fitwel: Fitwel is a certification program focused on protecting and improving
human health and well-being inside buildings. It assesses the various ways
a building's design and operations impact human health across seven categories:
Community Health, Morbidity and Absenteeism, Social Equity, Well-Being, Healthy
Food, Occupant Safety, and Physical Activity. The framework was developed
by the U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC) and the U.S. General Services
Administration (GSA), and the program is now managed by the Center for Active
Design (CfAD), which is a global nonprofit organization. Projects can achieve
Fitwel certification at one of three levels: one star, two stars, and three
stars.
Created as a joint initiative led by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention (CDC) and the General Services Administration (GSA) in addition
to experts in public health and design, Fitwel was introduced in 2015 and
launched for public use in 2017. The rating system is organized around specific,
incremental changes that will foster a healthier workplace, regardless of
size, construction year, or location. Fitwel stands for Facility Innovations
Toward Wellness Environment Leadership.
Like WELL, Fitwel focuses on the health and wellbeing of the building occupants
as well as the surrounding community. However, FitWel does not have any
prerequisites for completing this green building certification program. Like
the previously mentioned programs, FitWel can also be used in a variety of
building types and spaces. FitWel focuses on location, building access, outdoor
spaces, entrances, stairs, indoor environment, workspaces, shared spaces,
water supply, cafeterias and prepared food areas, vending machines and snack
bars, and emergency procedures. As of 2019, 840 were registered, and 240
had completed their FitWel certification. Top users of FitWel include
Skanska Alexandria Real Estate Equities Inc., and the Tower
Companies.
WELL Building Standard: Similar to Fitwel, the WELL Building Standard provides
guidelines for designing, constructing, and operating buildings to support
human health and wellness. WELL is administered by the International WELL
Building Institute (IWBI) and considers factors that can affect human health
across several categories, including Air, Water, Nourishment, Light, Fitness,
Comfort, and Mind. Projects pursuing WELL Certification can achieve one of
four certification levels: Bronze, Silver, Gold or Platinum.
WELL is a building certification program managed by the International WELL
Building Institute (IWBI). WELL focuses mostly on building design attributes
that impact occupant health and well-being. WELL evaluates buildings on 11
concepts: air, water, nourishment, light, movement, thermal comfort, sound,
materials, mind, community, and innovation. This green building system features
a few preconditions or prerequisites to completing a WELL certification.
Like LEED, WELL can be used for a wide variety of building and building spaces.
As of 2019, 3865 projects were registered, and 232 had earned their WELL
certification. Top users of WELL include Wells Fargo, EY, Deloitte, Lenovo,
and Fandango.
The WELL Community Standard™ pilot, introduced in 2014, is a district-scale
rating system centered exclusively on health and wellness that aims to set
a new global benchmark for healthy communities. With the launch of the WELL
Community Standard, IWBI is ushering in a new era of fostering and cultivating
neighborhoods, districts and other communities that have health and wellness
attributes built into their DNA.
Healthy Ventilation Certification Systems
BCMC: The Building Contagion Mitigation Certification (BCMC) Tool is a dashboard
that allows building owner operators to assess Virus Mitigation Levels in
their buildings and provides information to increase the Virus Mitigation
Levels, if needed. The BCMC easily performs before and after analysis when
upgrades are being considered so that choices can be made based on data not
speculation. The BCMC Tool is particularly useful for organizations with
limited budgets and resources like schools, restaurants, bars, community
clubhouses because it can be used by anyone. There are no special skills
that are needed other than the ability to read and the desire to do the work.
Yet the BCMC Tool easily scales up to massive projects involving hundreds
of buildings and thousands of rooms. Jump to
BCMC for more information.
SVARS: The Sustainable Ventilation Assessment and Rating System (SVARS) is a transparent self-reporting system to measure ventilation quality and carbon footprint sustainability performance levels for any facility and ensure that facilities operate at an optimum level. This includes effective operations and maintenance. The SVARS focuses exclusively on asking key ventilation and climate change plan questions that are part of key categories and applies a Maturity Level and Score. It is also structured so that it can be incorporated into other climate change rating systems. Jump to SVARS for more information.
References
[1] Top 12 Green Building Rating Systems, Sustainable Investment Group (SIG), June 01, 2020. https://sigearth.com/top-12-green-building-rating-systems, 2024
[2] Green Rating Systems, HDR, 2024. https://www.hdrinc.com/services/sustainability-resiliency/green-rating-systems, 2024.
[3] A Guide to Green Building Certifications in North America, Tuesday, May 09, 2023, Trusscore. https://trusscore.com/blog/a-guide-to-green-building-certifications-in-north-america.html, 2024.
[4] Building Air Quality Guide: A Guide for Building Owners and Facility Managers, EPA 402-F-91-102, December 1991. https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/building-air-quality-guide-guide-building-owners-and-facility-managers . PDF 2024.
[5] Improving Ventilation In Buildings, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention - CDC, Updated May 11, 2023. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/improving-ventilation-in-buildings.html, 2023.
[6] 5-step guide to checking ventilation rates in classrooms, T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Schools for Health, Harvard Healthy Buildings program. 2020. https://schools.forhealth.org/ventilation-guide . https://schools.forhealth.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2020/08/Harvard-Healthy-Buildings-program-How-to-assess-classroom-ventilation-08-28-2020.pdf, 2023.
[7] Sustainable Ventilation Assessment & Rating System (SVARS), Cassbeth, 2024. https://www.cassbeth.com/svars/index.html, 2024.
[8] COVID Data Tracker, Data Table for Weekly Deaths - The United States, CDC - Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Date generated: Sat Jun 08 2024 07:22:07 GMT-0400 (Eastern Daylight Time), 2024. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#trends_weeklydeaths_select_00, 2024.
[9] How COVID-19 Spreads, CDC - Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Updated Mar. 15, 2024. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/how-covid-spreads.html, 2024.
[10] COVID Data Tracke, CDC - Centers for Disease Control and Preventionr, Updated on May 10, 2024. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#datatracker-home
[11] The Sharp Decline in COVID-19 Mortality in 2023: Interpreting Good News in a Population Health Context, The Milbank Quarterly, November 13, 2023, Milbank Memorial Fund. https://www.milbank.org/quarterly/opinions/the-sharp-decline-in-covid-19-mortality-in-2023-interpreting-good-news-in-a-population-health-context, 2024.
On June 6, 2024 the The Department of Energy (DOE) announced a National Definition of a Zero Emissions Building. The definition is intended to provide industry guidance to support new and existing commercial and residential buildings to move towards zero emissions. [1]
There are nearly 130 million existing buildings in the United States, which collectively cost over $400 billion a year to heat, cool, light, and power, with 40 million new homes and 60 billion square feet of commercial floorspace expected to be constructed between 2024 and 2050. Establishing a consistent definition for a zero-emissions building will accelerate climate progress, while lowering home and business energy bills.
The National Definition of a Zero Emissions Building: Part 1 Operational Emissions from Energy Use sets criteria for determining that a building generates zero emissions from energy use in building operations. By the definition, at a minimum, a zero emissions building must be: [2]
Future parts of this definition may address emissions from embodied carbon (producing, transporting, installing, and disposing of building materials) and additional considerations.
The Definition is not a regulatory standard or a certification. It is guidance that public and private entities may adopt to determine whether a building has zero emissions from operational energy use. The definition is not a substitute for the green building and energy efficiency standards and certifications that public and private parties have developed.
Eight major green building certification programs in the U.S. announced that they will embed or align or exceed the zero emissions definition within their certification. Many certifications go even further to demonstrate climate leadership by exceeding the criteria of the definition.
In December 2021, President Biden signed Executive Order 14057 on Federal Sustainability and issued the Federal Sustainability Plan, which calls on agencies to achieve a federal net-zero emissions building portfolio by 2045. The Federal Government will use the National Definition in leasing net-zero emissions buildings, which will become the standard for Federal leases beginning in 2030.
The National Definition for a Zero Emissions Building aligns with the UN’s Buildings Breakthrough, which endorses the statement, "Near-zero emission and resilient buildings are the new normal by 2030."
The following are more guideline details:
Energy Efficient
At a minimum, an existing building must satisfy one of the following criteria:
Free of On-Site Emissions from Energy Use
Direct GHG emissions from energy use must equal zero. There is an exception for use of emergency backup generators when grid power is unavailable.
Powered Solely from Clean Energy
All energy used by the building must be clean energy, obtained through any combination of on and off site sources, as long as the GHG emissions from that clean energy equals zero. If the building obtains heating or cooling from a district energy system, the district energy must be generated from clean sources. On-site clean energy is encouraged to be maximized before procuring off-site clean energy.
To qualify as clean energy, each source of off-site power generation for the building must meet at least one of the following requirements:
References
[1] DOE Announces National Definition of a Zero Emissions Building, Press Release, U.S. Department of Energy | Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, June 6, 2024. https://www.energy.gov/articles/doe-announces-national-definition-zero-emissions-building, 2024.
[2] National Definition of a Zero Emissions Building Part 1: Operational Emissions from Energy Use, Version 1, U.S. Department of Energy | Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, June 2024. https://www.energy.gov/sites/default/files/2024-06/bto-national-definition-060524.pdf, 2024.
(STARS) is a transparent, self-reporting framework for colleges and universities to measure their sustainability performance. It is intended to engage and recognize the full spectrum of higher education institutions, from community colleges to research universities. It encompasses long-term sustainability goals for already high-achieving institutions, as well as entry points of recognition for institutions that are taking first steps toward sustainability. STARS is designed to [1]:
Through participating in STARS, institutions can earn points toward a STARS Bronze, Silver, Gold, or Platinum Rating, or earn the STARS Reporter designation. Each seal represents significant sustainability leadership. [1]
An examination of the rating system suggests that there are no explicit ventilation related metrics / requirements in the current rating system [2] [3] [4]. However, there are the following sections that could be used to capture ventilation performance and ensure that ventilation is not compromised in an effort to minimize carbon footprint:
Ideally ventilation would be added as a new line item in one or more of the above sections. This does not preclude institutions from using one or more of the sections to capture their ventilation performance claims. The IN section is not populated in STARS 2.2. The IN credits are optional credits. A new credit can be added:
[1] The Sustainability Tracking Assessment & Rating System, About STARS, https://stars.aashe.org/about-stars, web access 2024.
[2] STARS Technical Manual, Version 2.2 June 2019, Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE). https://stars.aashe.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/STARS-2.2-Technical-Manual.pdf, web access 2024.
[3] STARS 2.2 Credit Checklist Spreadsheet, Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE). https://stars.aashe.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/STARS-2.2-Credit-Checklist-2023-06.xlsx, web access 2024.
[4] Optional Credits STARS Innovation & Leadership Catalog Version 2.2 May 2019, Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE). https://stars.aashe.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/STARS-2.2-Innovation-Leadership-Catalog.pdf, web access 2024.
The Sustainable Ventilation Assessment and Rating System (SVARS) is a transparent self-reporting system to measure ventilation quality and carbon footprint sustainability performance levels for any facility and ensure that facilities operate at an optimum level. This includes effective operations and maintenance. The goals are to:
The SVARS focuses exclusively on asking key ventilation and climate change plan questions that are part of key categories and applies a Maturity Level and Score. It is also structured so that it can be incorporated into other climate change rating systems.
Jump
to SVARS for more information.
Because of the COVID-19 disaster, we re-learned the importance of facility ventilation. Suddenly when dealing with climate change ventilation enters the systems solution space. From a systems perspective the goal is to reduce carbon footprint but not at the cost of lost health or epidemics.
Facility ventilation rates have been dropping since the first energy crisis in the last century. Ventilation was reduced again when smoking was banned in public facilities. With sustainability goals, ventilation rates are being forced to drop even further. The challenge is to increase existing poor ventilation rates while reducing carbon footprints. A systems perspective must be applied to the sustainability (carbon footprint) and ventilation challenges in facilities.
The COVID-19 and seasonal flu research suggests that current facilities make people sick and some die, even with the availability of vaccines. This is a serious systems tradeoff challenge: Ventilation Carbon Footprint Vs. Health or Ventilation Carbon Footprint Vs. Climate Disasters. This like the COVID-19 disaster is big science and big engineering. Fortunately it is relatively easy to determine the carbon footprint from facility ventilation and this can be compared with the overall carbon footprint generated from all other human activities.
Ventilation Carbon Footprint Measurement and Modeling
As part of the COVID-19 Research From a Systems Perspective an analysis of ventilation costs was performed. The key data that was identified are the power levels required as a function of ventilation rate. This work is the basis for the Ventilation Carbon Footprint model. There are Two Static Models models that are developed. The first is a Fine Grain Model and the second is a Coarse Grain Model. The effort and attributes of each model are as follows:
See
Fine Grain Model
Coarse Grain Model
The parameters needed are:
Additional parameters needed are for the Coarse Grain Model:
The coarse grain model parameters are usually available because of existing activities associated with building management. The fine grain model parameters are usually not available and thus the need for the QII to gather the data. A QII is documented evidence that is not easily refuted by outsourced energy companies or HVAC staff that place all their faith in automated sensors. It is also a good way to validate any existing data from vendors or the HVAC staff.
The following table shows the power levels for mechanical and UV ventilation. The Mech Watts/CFM and UV Watts/CuFt are used in the model.
Power Levels
(1) 12 foot ceiling. |
The CO2 lbs. per Watt will vary per facility depending on the source of the power. The following table provides a list of power sources and CO2 per kWh.
CO2 per kWh
Fuel |
Efficiency |
Percentage Used |
Total Energy |
CO2 per kWh |
Natural Gas |
38% |
38.60% |
1.575 |
0.9 |
Coal |
29% |
21.80% |
899 |
2.34 |
Oil |
31% |
0.50% |
19 |
1.78 |
Fossil Fuel Total |
- |
60 9% |
2.493 |
1.42 Weighted Avg |
Nuclear |
290% |
18.90% |
778 |
0.03 |
Wind |
1164% |
9.20% |
380 |
0.02 |
Hydro |
317% |
6.30% |
260 |
0.05 |
Solar |
207% |
2.80% |
115 |
0.11 |
Biomass |
52% |
1.30% |
55 |
0.51 |
Geothermal |
514% |
0 4% |
16 |
0.08 |
Renewable Fuel Total |
- |
38.50% |
1,588 |
0.05 Weighted Avg |
Total |
- |
99 4% |
4,081 |
0.89 Weighted Avg |
The model should capture the baseline and the various ACH levels (5, 6, 12 ACH). This model can then be tweaked to run different scenarios like changing the mechanical ventilation motors, shifting to UV or other ventilation and or changing the power source mix to be more carbon friendly.
The following table is the Fine Grain Model. An example implementation of the model is in a spreadsheet. [Gen-Ventilation-Carbon-Footprint-Model Spreadsheet . Presentation]
The following links show the QII and fine grain model results: Medical Office QII (before CO2 model) . School QII (all reports) . School QII (Fine grain CO2 model) summary data at bottom.
Fine Grain Model
Equations / Source |
Model Parameters |
Values |
Values |
Values |
Values |
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
Length * Width |
Vent-1 Area |
|
- |
- |
- |
Anemometer |
Vent-1 Measured FPM |
|
- |
- |
- |
Vent CFM = Vent Area * FPM / 144 |
Vent CFM-1 |
|
- |
- |
- |
Total CFM = Vent 1 CFM + Vent 2 CFM + … |
Room Total CFM |
|
back calculated |
back calculated |
back calculated |
Room ACH = Total CFM *60 / Room cu-ft |
Room ACH |
|
|
|
|
If present, data is provided by vendor. |
Room eACH |
|
|
|
|
If present, data is provided by vendor. |
Room oACH (1) |
||||
Total Room ACH = ACH + eACH |
Total Room ACH |
|
5 |
6 |
7 |
|
- |
- |
|
|
|
0.52 - 0.68 or find your design data |
Mech Watts per CFM |
0.518 |
|
|
|
0.017 or find your design data (12 ft ceiling) |
UV Watts per Cu-Ft |
0.017 |
|
|
|
0.89 US 2023 or vary per facility power choices |
CO2 lbs. per Watt |
0.89 |
|
|
|
Mech Watts = Room CFM * Watts /CFM |
Mech Watts |
|
|
|
|
UV Watts = Room Cu-Ft * UV Watts/Cu-Ft |
UV Watts |
|
|
|
|
Total Watts = Mech Watts + UV Watts |
Total Watts |
|
|
|
|
Carbon Footprint = Total Watts * CO2 lbs./Watt |
Carbon Footprint |
|
|
|
|
Multiply carbon footprint by Hours On Hours: Days/Wk.: Days/Yr.: |
Total Carbon Footprint
Circle: |
|
|
|
|
(1) oACH can be natural ventilation. Room sanitizers, ionizers, and other devices use power and line items should be added as needed.
The following table is the Coarse Grain Model. An example implementation of the model is in a spreadsheet. [Gen-Ventilation-Carbon-Footprint-Model Spreadsheet . Presentation]
Coarse Grain Model
Equations / Source |
Model Parameters |
Values |
Values |
Values |
Values |
|
- |
- |
- |
- |
- |
Building SqFt = Length * Width |
Building Square Feet |
|
- |
- |
- |
Avg Ceiling Height is 9, 12 feet |
Average Room Height |
|
- |
- |
- |
Building Square Feet * Average Room Height |
Building Cubic Feet |
|
- |
- |
- |
From installation data |
Building Total CFM |
|
back calculated |
back calculated |
back calculated |
Total CFM *60 / Room cu-ft |
Building Avg ACH |
|
|
|
|
If present, data is provided by vendor. |
Building eACH |
|
|
|
|
If present, data is provided by vendor. |
Building oACH (1) |
||||
Building Avg ACH = ACH + eACH + oACH |
Building Avg ACH |
|
5 |
6 |
7 |
|
- |
- |
|
|
|
0.52 - 0.68 or find your design data |
Mech Watts per CFM |
0.518 |
|
|
|
0.017 or find your design data (12 ft ceiling) |
UV Watts per Cu-Ft |
0.017 |
|
|
|
0.89 US 2023 or vary per facility power choices |
CO2 lbs. per Watt |
0.89 |
|
|
|
Mech Watts = Room CFM * Watts /CFM |
Mech Watts |
|
|
|
|
UV Watts = Room Cu-Ft * UV Watts/Cu-Ft |
UV Watts |
|
|
|
|
Total Watts = Mech Watts + UV Watts |
Total Watts |
|
|
|
|
Carbon Footprint = Total Watts * CO2 lbs./Watt |
Carbon Footprint |
|
|
|
|
Multiply carbon footprint by Hours On Hours: Days/Wk.: Days/Yr.: |
Total Carbon Footprint
Circle: |
|
|
|
|
(1) oACH can be natural ventilation. Room sanitizers, ionizers, and other devices use power and line items should be added as needed.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has a document called Procedure for Measuring and Reporting Commercial Building Energy Performance that describes how to measure and report building energy [1]. The following are extracts from the document:
The procedure is divided into two tiers to differentiate the resolution of the results and the amount of effort typically required to complete the procedure. Tier 1 gives monthly and annual results for the facility as a whole, based primarily on utility meter readings. Tier 2 yields time-series results (typically 15- or 60-min data, which should correspond to the electrical demand billing scheme, if applicable), in addition to monthly and annual results, itemized by type of end use, based on submetering and a data acquisition system (DAS). With either Tier 1 or Tier 2, performance is measured for a period of 1 year to determine seasonal trends and annual totals. Typically, for a Tier 1 analysis of an existing building, such data have already been recorded on utility bills, so the procedure may be completed in a matter of days. For a Tier 1 analysis of a newly completed building, a 1-year waiting period will be necessary to collect the data. For a Tier 2 analysis, the measurement (which will take at least 1 year to complete) is part of the procedure.
Data Acquisition System (DAS): An automated data recording system that typically consists of a programmable data logger and numerous sensors and other transducers. It can record all the measurements needed to complete Tier 2 of this procedure. The recording interval should correspond to the applicable electrical demandbilling scheme, if applicable (typically 15- or 60-min data), so that the data enable demand-reduction strategies to be analyzed after the procedure is completed. (See also the definition of time series.) The system should be operated and the data collected for at least 1 year to allow seasonal trends and annual totals to be determined with this procedure.
Tier 1: The most basic level of a procedure, which yields the highest-level results. General characteristics of Tier 1 are that it (1) generally yields only monthly and annual results; (2) often requires only existing data, including utility bills, building drawings, and a physical examination (walk-through) of the building; and (3) is typically performed without installing additional metering equipment. In Tier 1 of this procedure, these means are used to determine and report monthly and annual purchased energy, electrical demand, facility energy production, and related metrics.
Tier 2: The advanced level of a procedure, which yields more detailed results. Most analysts who are interested in a detailed examination of a building's performance will perform a Tier 2 analysis. General characteristics of Tier 2 are that it (1) yields seasonal, daily, hourly, or subhourly (if appropriate) results; (2) yields results itemized by type of end use; and (3) requires new data to be recorded in addition to existing building data. Submetering and a DAS are generally employed.
The Tier 1 data collection is equivalent to the course grain model and the Tier 2 data collection is equivalent to the fine grain model. The metered data can be used to check the modeled data and the model data can be used to check the metered data.
A Building Automation System (BAS) or Data Acquisition System (DAS) is an automated data recording system that typically consists of a programmable data logger and numerous sensors and other transducers.
Building Management System / Building Automation System
Building management systems (BMS) is synonymous with the Building Automation System (BAS) and they are computer-based systems that are used in the building to automate functions. This system is intended to automate controls such as ventilation, protection, lighting, and power. This is useful for emergency procedures because it allows for improved reaction to incidents such as fire alarms, security breaches, air conditioning issues, and more. An example of an automatic fire safety system may be to make the elevators turned off safely at the ground floor, so that no one can access them in the event of a building fire. It also can be programmed for versatility and power for rooms. Approximately 40 percent of the total energy of buildings is usually controlled by a BMS, so if the BMS is configured incorrectly, it can account for 20 percent of the total energy consumption of buildings [4].
Energy management systems (EMS) are computer-based systems that measure energy consumption and look for spaces where energy efficiency could be improved. Among other items, energy management systems can be used to track device-level equipment such as HVAC units and lighting systems centrally across various locations. EMS offers an overall image of energy usage and when an issue occurs there is the ability to zoom in to data at the system level. Energy management systems may have the ability to calculate, send and track functions that allow managers of facilities and buildings to obtain data and information that enables them to make more informed decisions about energy activities across their sites. Energy management systems can reduce the energy usage of a 21-story building by 50 percent on average [4]. A study from 1996 suggests 19% to 29% [5].
Building Systems |
Watts (1) (2) |
No |
With |
With |
With |
| Mechanical ventilation power 5 ACH (1000 sqft 12 ft ceiling) (3) | 517 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| Mechanical ventilation power 12 ACH (1000 sqft 12 ft ceiling) | 1242 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
UV Ventilation 12 eACH (1000 sqft) |
207 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| Cooling Systems (1000 sqft) (5) | 2,500 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| Water Chiller Systems | Various |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| Electric Heating Systems | Various |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
LED / Incandescent Lighting power 300 lux (1000 sqft) |
443 / 1948 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
LED / Incandescent Lighting power 500 lux (1000 sqft) |
738 / 3246 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
LED / Incandescent Lighting power 750 lux (1000 sqft) |
1107 / 4869 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| LED TV (~ 65 in) | 100 |
100% |
(6) |
NA |
NA |
| Laptops Computer | 30 - 70 |
100% |
(6) |
NA |
NA |
| Large desktop Computer | 200 - 500 |
100% |
(6) |
NA |
NA |
| Other Machinery | Various |
100% |
(6) |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
(1) The numbers are approximate and will vary with specific design solutions
and with time (2023).
(2) The mechanical ventilation numbers are not linear because of duct
resistance.
(3) CDC guideline to aim for 5+ ACH.
(4) This is a function of how the occupants manage the building lights and
ventilation systems, do they / can they turn them off when they leave a
space.
(5) They cycle on and off while maintaining temperature, the issue is are
they running in unoccupied spaces.
(6) These systems have internal timers to turn off when there is no activity.
They need to be properly set.
(7) Estimates are 20% [4], other internet est. 5% - 15%
(8) Estimates are 50% [4], 19% - 29% [5], other internet est. 10% - 30%
EMS and BMS / BAS integrate well in total system solutions. The reason why it is so important to understand the difference between EMS and BMS / BAS is that they both serve the same purpose in a different way, but they complement each other. While an EMS concentrates on details at the micro-level, BMS / BAS focus on knowledge at the macro-level. This puts them in perfect complementary positions. However, it is important to remember that EMS and BMS speak two entirely different languages, and as such, a middleman / protocol is required to translate between the two. A BACnet is the most commonly-used converter.
The sensors deployed by an EMS collect and analyze every single piece of telemetry data at the device level, which is why the EMS functions at a micro-level. This data at the micro-level is what makes an EMS such a powerful method for making decisions. It provides insights into energy consumption and overall building efficiency, because it understands how each piece of equipment / HVAC unit works individually and can then compile the data together to give the facility or property manager a comprehensive picture analysis of what is actually happening. The manager can assess the overall energy consumption with the information being tracked, and can recognize particular units that are underperforming, as well as specific measures to maximize and regulate their usage of energy. The data and observations provided by an EMS is then used to customize the BMS in a way that addresses different areas, making it even more useful.
The data collected to support effective ventilation carbon footprint management should include as a minimum the following key ventilation reporting requirements:
No |
Reporting Requirements | Reporting Requirement Details |
| 1. | Room Ventilation kWh | Per shift, daily, weekly, monthly, yearly (1) |
| 2. | Room CFM | Minimum, Peak, and Average (1) |
| 3. | Room ACH | Minimum, Peak, and Average (1) |
| 4. | Building Ventilation kWh | Per shift, daily, weekly, monthly, yearly |
| 5. | Building CFM | Minimum, Peak, and Average |
| 6. | Building ACH | Minimum, Peak, and Average |
| 7. | Room cubic feet | For each room |
| 8. | Building cubic feet | For the building |
| 9. | Alarms and Event logs | For when the ACH drops below 5 ACH |
(1) This is not possible with most systems, instead zone data is collected. Although the values can be calculated for the rooms based on the zone data, this will not provide visibility into the rooms because the rooms may be compromised by occupants via blocked vents.
BAS vendors include:
The BAS system must support the previously identified key ventilation requirements for kWh, CFM, ACH, cubic feet, and alarms and event logs. Once implemented, a BAS system when effectively managed can automate a manual Ventilation Quality Improvement Indicator (QII) program. The Ventilation QII program becomes a review of the BAS reports.
The challenge is to properly instrument all the buildings and maintain the instrumentation. The other challenge is to realize that management will tune the system to only comply with the local building codes rather than the 5+ ACH guidance from the CDC. Further, as the pressure increases to reduce carbon footprints, local building codes will and are changing to further reduce the ventilation rates.
A BAS is costly to install and bring into operation for a large University Campus because of the large numbers of instrumentation units that need to be installed and then configured. It is difficult to justify the costs based on reduced power after the system becomes operational so most management will reject proposals to install these systems. Instead BAS will be found only in new buildings. However, for more enlightened and responsible management aware of the building ventilation crisis in the 21st century and the 5+ ACH CDC guidance, they will have a reasonable justification to move forward with BAS in all campus buildings.
The cost for a Building Automation System (BAS) depends on the specific components chosen, working with new construction or a building with legacy equipment, and location. The cost of deployment falls between $2.50 and $7.00 per square foot [2] [3]. If the BAS is used to provide healtier ventilation rather that just focus on minimum carbon footprint the savings can be as follows [2]:
Studies have found that healthier, more comfortable buildings increase worker productivity in multiple ways. Researchers at Harvard University estimate “that the productivity benefits from doubling the ventilation rates are $6,500 per person per year. This does not include the other potential health benefits, such as reduced sick building syndrome and absenteeism” while only costing about 40 cents per person annually. Other studies have found that employee productivity can increase by nearly 10% by just optimizing temperatures and ventilation from outside the building. Smart technology via BAS helps achieve these results. [2]
There is a carbon footprint associated with sick people from poor ventilation but is is unclear how that carbon footprint might be calculated.
The following table shows the size of the U.S. infrastructure in terms of numbers of facilities.
Infrastructure Size
| Facilities | Number of Facilities |
| School Districts | 16,800 |
| K-12 Schools In The U.S | 130,930 |
| Restaurants 2018 | 660,755 |
| Bars & Night Clubs 2021 | 59,052 |
| U.S. Commercial Buildings 97 Billion Square Feet 2018 | 5,900,000 |
| Brick-and-mortar Retail Stores 2020 | 328,208 |
| Veterinary Clinics | 28,000 |
| Assisted Living Facilities | 30,600 |
| Physical Therapy Rehabilitation | 45,905 |
| Nursing Homes | 15,600 |
| Hospitals 2019 | 13,944 |
| Urgent Care Facilities | 9,616 |
References
[1] Procedure for Measuring and Reporting Commercial Building Energy Performance, National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Technical Report NREL/TP-550-38601 October 2005. https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy06osti/38601.pdf, 2024.
[2] Getting Started With a Building Automation System: Cost Analysis & Breakdown, Buildings IOT, 2023. https://www.buildingsiot.com/blog/getting-started-with-a-building-automation-system-cost-analysis-breakdown-bd, 2024.
[3] How Much Does a Building Management System Cost? Mid-Atlantic Controls, December 6, 2022. https://info.midatlanticcontrols.com/blog/how-much-does-a-building-automation-system-cost, 2024.
[4] What Is The Difference Between Bms And Bas? Remote Fill Sytems, 2024. https://remotefillsystems.com/bas-what-is-the-difference-between-bms-and-bas, 2024.
[5] Performance of Energy Management Systems, American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), October 1996. https://www.aceee.org/files/proceedings/1994/data/papers/SS94_Panel5_Paper28.pdf, 2024.
At some point organizations will need to perform ventilation tradeoffs. To support the tradeoffs there are some key observations and relationships that should be internalized. These observations and relationships were surfaced with a systems analysis that is called Architecture Musings. This analysis runs different scenarios and assumptions to search for key observations. When this type of systems analysis is started it is unclear where it will go and if it will surface new insights. This analysis in captured in a spreadsheet. [ventilation-tradeoffs spreadsheet]
Observations
Cooling and heating CO2 budgets
are a given
Ventilation CO2 level is
directly related to power levels
The power budget in a home
is allocated to mechanical ventilation + LED lighting + appliances: refrig
+ dishwasher + washer + dryer + TV + Electronics
The power budget in public
spaces like classrooms, offices, and retail spaces are allocated to
mechanical ventilation and LED lighting
Key Relationships
Key Metric Items |
(1) (2) |
| Mechanical ventilation
power 1 ACH (1 cuft) |
0.0086 |
|
104 |
| Mechanical ventilation
power 4 ACH (1000 sqft 12 ft ceiling) |
414 |
| Mechanical ventilation
power 5 ACH (1000 sqft 12 ft ceiling) (4) |
517 |
| Mechanical ventilation
power 6 ACH (1000 sqft 12 ft ceiling) |
621 |
| Mechanical ventilation
power 12 ACH (1000 sqft 12 ft ceiling) |
1242 |
|
207 |
|
443 / 1948 |
|
738 / 3246 |
|
1107 / 4869 |
| LED TV (~ 65 in) |
100 |
| Annual Hours | |
| Ventilation Quality
Improvement Indicator Program QIDC |
3 - 6 (3) |
|
crowd sourced |
(1) The numbers are approximate and will vary with specific design solutions
and with time (2023).
(2) The mechanical ventilation numbers are not linear because of duct
resistance.
(3) Per 1,000 sq-ft
(4) CDC guideline to aim for 5+ ACH
Although these numbers are approximations, they are a good gauge to make comparisons of different architecture choices.
Mechanical Ventilation for a Large University
Key Requirements
The key requirements for mechanical ventilation systems are:
Optimizing Existing Mechanical Ventilation
This systems analysis is for optimizing the existing mechanical ventilation systems for a Large University. Making the best of what exists is a reasonable approach. There are alternatives to doing this like hiring an outside company or using internal University staff dedicated to new positions associated with optimizing the ventilation systems. Most universities are doing most of the suggestions, the problem is that most Universities are staff challenged and unable to take on additional work. [4] [5] The following is a list of suggestions:
These are extremely large systems and things will fall through the cracks unless there is a formal process with accountability and independent review. An independent Ventilation QII program is the key to optimizing any mechanical ventilation system to ensure that there is minimal carbon footprint and appropriate ACH levels throughout all the facilities. See QIDC . Ventilation Scorecard . Occupant Observations (OCP). [1] [2] [3]
References
[1] Improving Ventilation In Buildings, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention - CDC, Updated May 11, 2023. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/improving-ventilation-in-buildings.html, 2023.
[2] 5-step guide to checking ventilation rates in classrooms, T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Schools for Health, Harvard Healthy Buildings program. 2020. https://schools.forhealth.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2020/08/Harvard-Healthy-Buildings-program-How-to-assess-classroom-ventilation-08-28-2020.pdf, 2023.
[3] Guidelines for Environmental Infection Control in Health-Care Facilities (2003), Centers For Disease Control and Prevention - CDC. https://www.cdc.gov/infectioncontrol/guidelines/environmental/appendix/air.html, 2023.
[4] Pace University Coordinated Energy Management Strategy, Better Buildings, U.S. Department of Energy, 2024. accessed 2024 Web Link.
[5] Pace University: Coordinated Energy Management Strategy, Distributed Energy Resources, Energy Efficiency, GHG Emissions - April 12, 2024. accessed 2024 Web Link.
UV Ventilation for a Large University
This systems analysis is a conceptual system architecture for implementing UV Ventilation for a Large University. As with all large infrastructure upgrades a program needs to be established that has a time line and milestones. The program should start with a small pilot project so that experience can be gained for the eventual massive rollout of the solutions. Because a large university will have a diverse set of buildings, there will be different UV system solutions.
If you are looking to come up to speed on ventilation and carbon footprint: Presentation . Ventilation Tradeoffs
If you are looking to come up to speed on ventilation: Building Ventilation Video.
If you are looking to come up to speed on why ventilation must be addressed in Climate Action Plans:
A program needs to be structured. These are suggestions for the activities and projects in the UV ventilation program:
The following is the type of infrastructure that may exist in a large university. The type of infrastructure will drive the applicability of UV ventilation and the type of UV ventilation - Ceiling Level UV-C or FAR UV system. The recommendations are based on getting the greatest airborne contagion mitigation benefit. For example, placing systems in personal offices will have minimal benefit because a personal office rarely will have multiple occupants while a classroom will have many occupants and this will have massive benefit. Ceiling level UV-C systems are considered to be extremely mature technology with a proven track record, so they are the first recommendation, the FAR UV systems are the secondary recommendation. The table shows the 3 phases of the full program. The first phase addresses the highest risk of airborne infection risk.
Room Type |
UV-C |
FAR-UV |
Rooms |
Phase |
Sq-Ft |
Total |
Carbon Footprint |
Contagion |
Comments |
| Classrooms with no HVAC | X |
X |
200 |
1 |
1,000 |
200,000 |
Lowered |
High |
This is typically an old building with a heating system but no ventilation system of any type. If the ventilation level is brought into CDC guideline of 5 ACH, mechanical ventilation carbon footprint >> UV system carbon footprint. |
| Classrooms with HVAC ACH << 5 | X |
X |
1000 |
2 |
1,000 |
1,000,000 |
Lowered |
High |
This is a newer building that may have a central HVAC system or in-room classroom unit ventilators. If the ventilation level is brought into CDC guideline of 5 ACH, mechanical ventilation carbon footprint >> UV system carbon footprint. |
| Classrooms with HVAC ACH > 5 | - |
X |
250 |
3 |
1,000 |
250,000 |
Lowered |
Same |
This is where there may be reduced carbon footprint opportunities. Bringing down the ACH level and supplementing the mechanical ventilation with a UV system will reduce carbon footprint. |
| Computer Labs | NA |
NA |
50 |
- |
1,000 |
50,000 |
- |
Low |
Computers run hot and it is likely that in order to keep the computers from over heating the lab will have ACH >> 5 |
| Cafeterias | X |
- |
5 |
1 |
5,000 |
25,000 |
Lowered |
High |
This is a source of mass infections. This is where there may be reduced carbon footprint opportunities. Bringing down the ACH level and supplementing the mechanical ventilation with a UV system will reduce carbon footprint. |
| Lecture Halls | X |
- |
50 |
1 |
10,000 |
500,000 |
Lowered |
High |
This is a source of mass infections. This is where there may be reduced carbon footprint opportunities. Bringing down the ACH level and supplementing the mechanical ventilation with a UV system will reduce carbon footprint. |
| Public Gathering Spaces | - |
X |
50 |
2 |
2,500 |
125,000 |
Lowered |
High |
This is a source of mass infections. This is where there may be reduced carbon footprint opportunities. Bringing down the ACH level and supplementing the mechanical ventilation with a UV system will reduce carbon footprint. |
| Study Spaces | - |
X |
50 |
2 |
2,500 |
125,000 |
Lowered |
High |
This is a source of mass infections. This is where there may be reduced carbon footprint opportunities. Bringing down the ACH level and supplementing the mechanical ventilation with a UV system will reduce carbon footprint. |
| Auditoriums | NA |
NA |
20 |
- |
10,000 |
200,000 |
- |
None |
These are typically well ventilated spaces because of the crowd density based on seating. |
| Restrooms | X |
X |
200 |
3 |
400 |
80,000 |
- |
Low |
There may be risk of tampering with UV-C systems. |
| Dorm Rooms | - |
X |
1000 |
3 |
900 |
900,000 |
Lowered |
Med |
This one is tricky because most dorm rooms are shared spaces but the occupants spend long periods of time in the space. FAR-UV is recommended because of the risk of tampering with UV-C systems. These are on demand systems and the ventilation runs only to maintain temperature. If the ventilation level is brought into CDC guideline of 5 ACH, mechanical ventilation carbon footprint >> UV system carbon footprint. |
| Private Offices | - |
- |
500 |
- |
225 |
112,500 |
- |
Very Low |
Private offices typically do not have multiple occupants so there is little risk of contagion spread. |
| Conference Rooms | X |
X |
100 |
2 |
900 |
90,000 |
Lowered |
High |
This is a source of mass infections. This is where there may be reduced carbon footprint opportunities. Bringing down the ACH level and supplementing the mechanical ventilation with a UV system will reduce carbon footprint. |
| Rented Buildings | ? |
? |
1000 |
3 |
1,000 |
1,000,000 |
? |
? |
These are problem spaces because there is limited control. These buildings need an independent ventilation QII program. The data can then be presented to the owners to force investment in UV systems. It is assumed the utility costs are passed through to the renter. Forcing these systems may reduce rental costs. |
|
The number estimates are notional. They are only provided to suggest the scale of the program. The above analysis suggests that there are massive opportunities to reduce carbon footprint if the 5 ACH CDC guideline is to be satisfied. The practical results probably will be significantly lower, however the analysis suggests that this program should be seriously considered and a pilot project should be started.
A key observation is that if UV systems are rolled out, there is no need for a Ventilation QII program to be applied to the UV spaces. Unlike mechanical systems which can easily have degraded room ventilation for a multitude of reasons, not the least of which is the lack of monitoring of the ventilation rates at the room level, the UV systems have less modes of failure or degradation in an operational setting. They have in room sensors that provide continuous monitoring and are not susceptible to occupant tampering because there are no comfort issues associated with the UV systems. They do not cycle like most mechanical systems, they do not require sophisticated control software to changing conditions. They are just On or Off based on a simple occupant sensor. When On, the ventilation is always at the highest design level.
The following are mechanical ventilation challenges:
The purpose of a mechanical ventilation system is to ensure that CO2 levels are maintained to not harm the occupants and not reduce their cognitive performance levels. The purpose of a UV system is to ventilate a space to reduce the risk of infection from airborne contagions. UV systems are just better / more efficient / lower carbon footprint at removing airborne contagions. This solution is called a hybrid architecture solution. The concept is to use the best architecture subsystem for a total solution and not force a subsystem into stressful operation to achieve a performance requirement. The total solution has 2 key requirements: (1) maintain proper CO2 levels and (2) reduce the risk of airborne contagions. Comfort level is a given but it has nothing to do with mitigating grave harm from CO2 and airborne contagions.
Observations: Prior to this systems analysis there were no indications of any of these findings. These results are significant and they need to be validated by multiple stakeholders.
There are product cost estimates that were determine as part of the COVID-19 research from a systems perspective. The product cost estimates are for small clients. It is unclear what the product costs are for extremely large projects. UV-Infrastructure-Cost-Estimates . Ventilation Products Testing and Cost Tradeoffs. These are some of the key num.bers and a Return on Investment model. [spreadsheet ROI tab]
Key Metric Items |
Performance |
| UV Purchase Cost Per sq-ft | $1.76 (1) |
| Mechanical Blower Purchase Cost Per sq-ft | $0.78 |
| UV Watts / eACH (10824 cu-ft) | 15.58 |
| Mechanical Watts / ACH (10824 cu-ft) | 122.40 |
| Operating Savings Factor | 8 |
| Cost per kWh | $0.17 |
| Payback year @ 2 ACH | 5 years (1) |
| Payback year @ 3 ACH | 4 years (1) |
| Payback year @ 4 ACH | 3 years (1) |
| Payback year @ 5 ACH | 2 years (1) |
| Payback year @ 6 ACH | 2 years (1) |
| Payback year @ 10 ACH | 1 years (1) |
(1) Based on buying turnkey products.
The return on investment for a UV system is a function of the ACH level that a mechanical system would need to provide. The higher the mechanical ACH level the greater the power requirements. Since the mechanical power is 8 times greater than UV power, the ROI happens quickly when the ACH levels approach 5 ACH. If there is a desire to build the system using piece parts the price is approximately $0.20 Per sq-ft and the ROI is in the first year with 1-2 ACH. A piece part vendor / distributor is: https://www.prolampsales.com
The model runs the mechanical system at the selected ACH level and then runs the UV system at the selected ACH level. In an operational setting, this assumes that an exiting mechanical system is operating at a very low ACH level and it needs to be mechanically boosted or supplemented with a UV system. The numbers are approximate and do not consider the finer details of the simultaneous operation of the two systems.
UV Operational Test and Evaluation Program
The purpose of an Operational Test and Evaluation Program is to validate a system by subjecting it to a real world setting. The system is installed in what are called key sites and operational staff live with the system and users rely on the system in a way where operations are not disrupted. There is always a way to fall back to the previous system or use the previous system in parallel. This system will have little impact on the operational staff and users. Instead the effectiveness of the system needs to be determined to justify full scale roll out.
The approach to determine the effectiveness of UV systems in an operational setting is to use Petri dishes and collect ambient cultures from multiple room / space types for both UV and non-UV room / spaces. The testing is started during the Demo project and continues with the pilot program. The larger the the sample size the better. The following are the suggested test locations. The numbers indicate the number of rooms / spaces to be populated with Petri dishes.
While the Petri dishes only collect ambient bacteria cultures, these cultures can be used as a tracer indicator to suggest that there is a similar drop in virus load. This tracer connection is a resaonable assumption because of tests that have been performed in settings where virus load reductions have been studied. See the COVID-19 research from a systems perspective UV-C-Ceiling-Level-Lights and scroll to table: Disinfection time in seconds at 30,000 uW/cm2 or 30mJ/cm2. The tables are duplicated at the end of this section.
Room Type |
Control |
UV-C |
FAR-UV |
Room |
UV |
Test |
Comments Note: UV systems are 5 weeks On then 5 weeks Off to further remove inconsistent populations |
| Classrooms with no HVAC | 3 |
1 |
1 |
1,000 |
2 |
Demo |
Control room uses room sanitzers if they are present. Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Classrooms with HVAC ACH << 5 | 3 |
1 |
1 |
1,000 |
2 |
Pilot Project |
Control room uses room sanitzers if they are present. Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Classrooms with HVAC ACH > 5 | 3 |
1 |
1 |
1,000 |
2 |
Pilot Project |
Reduce room ACH to 5 ACH. Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Computer Labs | 3 |
NA |
NA |
1,000 |
0 |
Pilot Project |
|
| Cafeterias | 1 |
1 |
- |
5,000 |
1 |
Pilot Project |
Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Lecture Halls | 3 |
1 |
- |
10,000 |
1 |
Pilot Project |
Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Public Gathering Spaces | 3 |
- |
1 |
2,500 |
1 |
Pilot Project |
Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Study Spaces | 3 |
- |
1 |
2,500 |
1 |
Pilot Project |
Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Auditoriums | 1 |
NA |
NA |
10,000 |
0 |
Pilot Project |
|
| Restrooms | 3 |
1 |
1 |
400 |
2 |
Pilot Project |
Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Dorm Rooms | 3 |
- |
1 |
900 |
1 |
Pilot Project |
Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Private Offices | 3 |
- |
- |
225 |
0 |
Pilot Project |
|
| Conference Rooms | 3 |
1 |
1 |
900 |
2 |
Pilot Project |
Measure power levels in each room to determine carbon footprint impacts. |
| Rented Buildings | 10 |
? |
? |
1,000 |
? |
Pilot Project |
|
Total Rooms |
45 |
7 |
8 |
15 |
The Control no UV spaces will not only help determine the effectiveness of the UV systems, the data also will allow for comparisons across room types to determine the most problematic spaces. For more information on contagion mitigation testing see the COVID-19 research from a systems perspective Proposed-Ventilation-Test-and-Evaluation-Program.
The Demo will use 2 UV systems. The Pilot Project will add an additional 13 UV systems for a total of 15 UV systems. The capital cost of this project will be approximately $15,000 to $20,000 if the systems are purchased. It will be lower if the systems are rented. If the systems are built using piece parts the capital cost of this project is approximately 10% the cost of turnkey products or $1,500 - $2,000.
UV Mechanism and Airborne Contagion Destruction
Solar radiation is mostly optical radiation [radiant energy within a broad region of the electromagnetic spectrum that includes ultraviolet (UV), visible (light) and infrared radiation], although both shorter wavelength (ionizing) and longer wavelength (microwaves and radiofrequency) radiation is present. The wavelength of UV radiation (UVR) lies in the range of 100 - 400 nm, and is further subdivided into UVA (315 - 400 nm), UVB (280 - 315 nm), and UVC (100 - 280 nm). The UV component of terrestrial radiation from the midday sun is about 95% UVA and 5% UVB. The UVC and most of the UVB radiation wavelengths are removed by the stratospheric ozone. UVC is not present in natural sunlight at the surface of the earth. [1]
References
[1] International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) Working Group on the Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans. Radiation. Lyon (FR): International Agency for Research on Cancer; 2012. (IARC Monographs on the Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans, No. 100D.) SOLAR AND ULTRAVIOLET RADIATION. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK304366
The following is a key extract from the COVID-19 research from a systems perspective UV-C-Ceiling-Level-Lights, scroll through the section to find the references.
UVGI damages living cells by directly or indirectly affecting the molecular structure of nucleic acids such as deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). Other studies have indicated that UVGI may also affect cytoplasmic and membrane structures. The photobiological reaction (e.g. the formation of covalent bonds between adjacent thymine bases in DNA) that may occur when a photon of UVGI (at 254 nm) strikes a cell translates into cellular or genetic damage that may lead to cell death or inability to successfully replicate. UVGI provides a significant germicidal effect since many biological polymers absorb energy in this bandwidth.
UVGI is absorbed by the outer surfaces of the eyes and skin. Short-term overexposure may result in photokeratitis (inflammation of the cornea) and/or keratoconjunctivitis (inflammation of the conjunctiva). Keratoconjunctivitis may be debilitating for several days but is reversible. Because these effects usually manifest themselves in 6 to 12 hours after exposure, their relationship to UVGI exposure may be overlooked. Symptoms may include an abrupt sensation of sand in the eyes, tearing, and eye pain that may be severe. Skin overexposure is similar to sunburn but does not result in tanning. Several instances of healthcare workers overexposed to UVGI have been reported. Five workers in a hospital emergency room were reported to have developed dermatosis or photokeratitis after exposure to high UVGI levels from a germicidal lamp. An investigation of the incident determined that a UV lamp was unshielded. Additional reports of overexposure to UVGI from unshielded lamps have been reported in a hospital in Botswana and a morgue in the United States.
UV-A and UV-B can damage skin |
Penetration Level
UV-C 100 - 280 nm |
UV-C radiation has been shown to destroy the outer protein coating of the SARS-Coronavirus and the outer protein coating destruction leads to the inactivation of the virus. In 1947 during the Measles virus classroom study the UV levels were: average ultra-violet light intensity of 10 to 20 milliwatts per sq. ft. throughout the upper air; and 0.2 to 0.5 milliwatts per sq. ft. (or microwatts per sq. cm.) at face level of standing pupils. These numbers can be used as a reference for other analysis typically presented in microwatts per square centimeter:
The following table shows the disinfection time at 30,000 uW/cm2 or 30mJ/cm2 for bacteria, viruses, fungi and protozoa such as Cryptosporidium, Giardia, SARS, H5N 1 within one second.
This table suggests that Petri dishes can be used as a tracer for virus
destruction and or removal.
| Infection Source |
100% kill |
Infection Source |
100% kill |
Bacteria |
|||
| Anthraces | 0.30 | Tuberculosis | 0.41 |
| Diphtheria | 0.25 | Vibrio Cholera | 0.64 |
| Clostridium Botulism | 0.80 | Pseudo monas Bacteria | 0.37 |
| Tetanus | 0.33 | Salmonella | 0.51 |
| Dysentery Bacillus | 0.15 | Fever Bacteria | 0.41 |
| Colibacillus | 0.36 | Bacillus Typhi murium | 0.53 |
| Hook-side Pylon Bacillus | 0.20 | Shigella | 0.28 |
| Legion Ella | 0.20 | Staphylococcus | 1.23 |
| Micro co | 0.4-1.53 | Streptococcus | 0.45 |
Virus |
|||
| Adenovirus | 0.10 | Influenza Virus | 0.23 |
| Phagocyte Cell Virus | 0.20 | Polio Virus | 0.80 |
| Coxsackie Virus | 0.08 | Rota Virus | 0.52 |
| ECHO Virus | 0.73 | Tobacco Mosaic Virus | 16.00 |
| ECHO Virus 1 | 0.75 | Hepatitis B Virus | 0.73 |
Mold Spores |
|||
| Aspergillums Niger | 6.67 | Soft Spores | 0.33 |
| Aspergillums | 0.73-8.80 | Penicillium | 2.93-0.87 |
| Dung Fungi | 8.00 | Penicillium Chrysogenum | 2.00-3.33 |
| Mucor | 0.23-4.67 | Other Fungi Penicillium | 0.87 |
Water Algae |
|||
| Blue-green algae | 10-40 | Paramecium | 7.30 |
| Chlorella | 0.93 | Green Algae | 1.22 |
| Line Ovum | 3.40 | Protozoan | 4-6.7 |
Fish Disease |
|||
| Pang I Disuse | 1.6 | Infectious Pancreatic Necrosis | 4 |
| Leukodennia | 2.67 | Hemorrhagic | 1.6 |
The following analysis shows how long the virus needs to be exposed with lower power levels. It assumes 100% destruction and a linear time relationship. The original studies in 1937 - 1943 used power levels of 10-20 uW/cm2 with an unknown mechnical ACH.
100% destroyed |
UV-C |
ACH |
kill |
Comment |
1 |
30000 |
3600 |
0.000277778 |
|
60 |
500 |
60 |
0.016666667 |
|
600 |
50 |
6 |
0.166666667 |
|
900 |
33 |
4 |
0.25 |
Design to criteria |
1800 |
17 |
2 |
0.5 |
|
3600 |
8 |
1 |
1 |
|
The COVID-19 research used AUC (air update changes) rather than ACH (air changes per hour). The decision to use AUC rather than ACH was based on the massively toxic politcally charged environment at the time, circa 2020. For all the analysis AUC = ACH.
The FAR-UV performance is also part of the COVID-19 research from a systems perspective FAR-UV-Performance, scroll through the section to see the references.
As of February 2022, it appears that FAR UV systems are moving quickly into the market and infrastructure. There is now reasonable performance data available on these systems. The following is an example of available performance data. The 99% COVID-19 disinfection time as a function of distance is:
With this data it is possible to determine some eACH performance numbers. The following table shows some of the possible eACH performance numbers for a FAR UV system.
Ceiling Height = 9 feet
% of Room Height = Feet / 9 foot ceiling
eACH = 1/Time min
eACH slice = eACH * % of Room Height
| Meters | Feet | % of Room Height |
Time sec |
Time min |
eACH | eACH slice | Comments |
| 0.50 | 1.64 | 0.18 | 30 | 0.50 | 120.00 | 21.87 | |
| 1.50 | 4.92 | 0.55 | 4.50 | 13.33 | 7.29 | The eACH avg 3 feet from floor level can be calculated | |
| 2.50 | 8.20 | 0.91 | 12.40 | 4.84 | 4.41 | The eACH avg feet level can be calculated | |
| Average | 11.19 | ||||||
| . | eACH | . | . | . | . | . | . |
| eACH avg 3 foot from floor level | 14.58 | ||||||
| eACH avg floor level | 11.19 |
Just like for the UV-C systems, it is reasonable to assume that using Petri dishes as a tracer can be used for an Operational Test and Evaluation program.
Additional UV Research References
The following UV references are found in the UV sections of the COVID-19 Research from a Systems Perspective.
The following UV references are in addition to the references found in the COVID-19 Research from a Systems Perspective. They originate from:
Ozone and ultra-fine particle concentrations in a hotel quarantine facility during 222 nm far-UVC air disinfection,
Petri Kalliomäki1, Hamed Sobhani2, Phillip Stratton3,4, Kristen K. Coleman1, Aditya Srikakulapu 1, Ross Salawitch 3, Russell R. Dickerson 3, Shengwei Zhu 2, Jelena Srebric 2 and Donald K. Milton 1;1 University of Maryland, School of Public Health, College Park, MD, USA,
2 University of Maryland, Department of Mechanical Engineering, College Park, MD, USA,
3 University of Maryland, Department of Atmospheric & Oceanic Science, College Park, MD, USA,
4 Air Resources Laboratory, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), College Park, MD, USA.https://doi.org//10.1101/2023.09.29.23296366; https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.09.29.23296366v1.full.pdf. 2023.
UV References
Air Quality References
Other Ventilation Technologies
In the context of UV ventilation the discussions always tend to drift towards other technologies. The following is an assessment of the other technologies.
1. Ionizers: The Philadelphia school district purchased thousands of room ionizers. Their system is based on the contagion mitigation ventilation approach selected by NASA for the space shuttle, and it worked for NASA. The problem is that the space shuttle is a small closed system. Classrooms have doors that open and close, people move in an out constantly, HVAC systems are running, and the rooms are much larger than the space shuttle. It is unclear what happens to the IONS when the children move in and out of the space, the door is open and what is the ION production rate for a 30x30x10 foot space. Without knowing the ION production and loss rate the system cannot be trusted to do what it is supposed to do. The eACH levels are unclear.
2. UV Induct Systems: Thousands of schools purchased UV systems, but they were in-duct UV systems. These systems are great for keeping the HVAC ducts clean, they might improve filtration performance, but they do nothing for the space where an infected person is releasing an airborne contagion and it is just lingering there because the ACH is low. The schools were sold systems that did not address their critical need of cleaning the classroom air. Proposed legislation was offered which included a proper education / standards component. The resulting legislation only took the cost estimate of $120 billion and passed it to the schools with no oversight. The result was friends and family just sold stuff / snake oil to the local school boards. These systems provide 0 eACH in a room.
3. In room Sanitizers: They are portable, so the motors and physical structure are small. The problem with these systems is that they are too small for classrooms (< 1-2 ACH). They are okay for a small personal office. When the max setting is selected, which is what is needed for the high CFM levels, they are too noisy. This is why HVAC fans are not in occupied rooms. These systems are viewed as a last ditch alternative with the thinking that any low level ACH is better than nothing. The problem is that this instills false confidence. We know from empirical data that people get infected when ACH is 1 or less. The current CDC guideline for all rooms is 5 ACH. These systems provide 1 - 2 ACH.
4. Classroom Unit Ventilators: These are designed for classroom use and they are a proven approach to ventilation. They existed in the 1960's and 1970's and fell out of favor when central HVAC systems started to move into the infrastructure. These units however move a large amount of air that can be easily filtered and are very quiet. They can easily achieve 12 ACH in a classroom.
5. Ceiling Level UV systems: These systems are recommended by the CDC and the National Academy of Sciences. They are used in industrial and hospital settings. There are companies that have surfaced that need to be closely vetted. The piece parts are very low cost ~ 10% the cost of a turnkey product. These systems can provide 12+ ACH in a room.
6. FAR UV systems. These systems illuminate an entire space. FAR UV systems, while new, fall into the same category as Ceiling Level UV systems in terms of research and reasonable performance expectations. However, the prices have significantly gone up. The vendors are killing the market before it has even been established. Because of this one vendor https://www.rzero.com is offering to lease systems which includes maintenance and management. These systems can provide 12+ ACH in a room.
7. HVAC Mechanical Ventilation: This can work if the system is properly sized, designed, operated, and maintained. The problem is that the duct work in many buildings is too small to handle the new FAN sizes needed for the new ventilation rates. They also have been compromised because only CO2 poisoning is the primary concern and comfort level is the secondary concern. There is no concern for lowering the risk of airborne contagions except in hospital settings where there is a special ASHRAE hospital standard based on the CDC ACH hospital guidelines. Research also suggests that most facilities are poorly operated and maintained. These systems typically run at 1 - 2 ACH because they cycle. When they are placed in fan mode they typically run 3 - 5 ACH. Special systems systems can provide 60 ACH.
8. Exhaust Fans: Exhaust fans are great at ventilating small and large spaces. When properly applied they can easily achieve 60+ ACH and 100 ACH is possible. Once again people do irrational things and the Philadelphia school district purchased cheap window exhaust fans that move little to no air and only provided what management thought was a good damage control solution. When sized properly, which is an easy exercise, the problem is that the air is not conditioned and will bring in hot, cold, humid, and or polluted air.
9. Nano Particle Sprays: Basically, nana particles encase decontamination agents that slowly release the agents over time. The idea is that the particles attach to walls, ceilings, and other surfaces and poof a release occurs at different times from each of these particles. Systems assessment: too new, uneven application will yield uneven performance levels, very high risk. The eACH levels are unclear.
10. Natural Ventilation: Natural ventilation is based on open windows, open doors, and building wind tunnels. It is an excellent ventilation approach for some regions of the world. Unfortunately climate dictates when and where natural ventilation can be used today. It also requires people who understand the importance of ventilation and know when to open the windows. We may find that new architectures in the 21st century may use natural ventilation using building wind tunnels, intelligent windows with filtration mixed with mechanical, UV, and other ventilation approaches to provide healthy room air and low carbon footprints. Natural ventilation can provide 37+ ACH.
These are links to some of the systems research:
In 2006 Cassbeth began to investigate Global Warming. This directly resulted in new textbooks and new University Level courses on systems engineering with sustainability as one of the major themes in the books and the courses. Since 2008 university level students have benefited from this research and work. In 2020 with the outbreak of COVID-19, Cassbeth began research on the disaster and quickly focused on airborne infection and facility ventilation to mitigate airborne infection. In 2023 Cassbeth began to investigate Climate Change Action Plans and the two areas of Cassbeth research merged. There is a direct relationship between facility ventilation levels, risk of infection, and ventilation carbon footprint. With this intersection the following research projects are proposed.
1. Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Quality Improvement Indicator Applied Research Project
Quality Improvement Indicators (QII) are used to detect how well current systems are working, allow for comparisons between entities, enable assessments of improvement over time, and improve transparency. They are a fundamental tool associated with effective Quality Programs. Contrary to what some assume, they are not just found in health care settings, they are found in all important systems and they are a key systems engineering tool that is part of the systems engineering specialty area known as Quality Assurance and Assessment.
The Ventilation and Carbon Footprint QII applied research project will use focus groups to develop effective QIIs that can be used in various facilities across the infrastructure to assess both ventilation and carbon footprints. This will include the development of an effective software platform to implement the QIIs. The software is a key element in implementing effective QIIs because of the amount of data that is collected in large facilities like a University.
There is an existing body of work that this research will build upon and it is located at: QIDC
The initial research will focus on a large University Campus.
2. Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Alarms System Applied Research Project
A building ventilation system is a life support system and if it does not work properly people will be harmed. Respiratory contagions are spread by inhaled aerosols. Outdoors, dilution of aerosols are infinite although the time it takes to dilute clouds of aerosol depends on air movement. Indoors, aerosols linger much longer than outdoors, often long enough to be inhaled by someone sharing the same space. If one breathes in an indoor setting where other people are also breathing, if the ventilation is poor, they will breathe in some of the air that someone else exhaled. Ventilation is the way that the risk of indoor airborne infection is reduced.
One of the challenges of existing HVAC systems is that sensors are placed far from individual room ventilation grills leading to incorrect status. Also the status is hidden from the building occupants and so there is no indication to room occupants if the ventilation levels are degraded. Further many facilities have outsourced their ventilation system energy needs leading to system ventilation compromises.
This applied research project will develop a system that allows users to understand their buildings ventilation and alert occupants to possible ventilation issues in the same way that carbon monoxide and smoke detectors alert occupants to carbon monoxide and fire hazards. There is a direct link between ventilation levels and carbon footprint. This system will also report the carbon footprint associated with the realtime measurements of the ventilation levels. The system consists of new ventilation measurement grills, external interfaces to UV and HVAC systems, databases, manual and automated data input mechanisms, rules processor, risk benefit levels, building certificates and reports. Data is input into the system and subjected to a rules processor and risk benefit levels. The data is stored in a database and available for generating reports and building certificates. The data for each unique assessed space is optionally stored in a global database housing multiple assessments for comparison. All status, control, and data is accessible via the Internet as part of the Internet of Things (IoT).
There is an existing body of work that this research will build upon and it is located at: Airborne Contagion Assessment Ventilation Alarms System
There is a specification with design level requirements.
The initial focus of this research is to develop the following hardware and software:
Follow on research will develop the following hardware and software:
3. Realtime Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Quality Improvement Indicator Applied Research Project
This project will build on top of two other research projects: (1) Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Quality Improvement Indicator and (2) Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Alarms System. With the realtime sensors available realtime data will be collected and compared with the manual data collected with the Ventilation and Carbon Footprint Quality Improvement Indicator project. The project will instrument 30+ rooms. Based on the findings a mass production design of the External Ventilation Vents and Grills Measurement with Alarms device will be finalized.
There is an existing body of work that this research will build upon and it is located at: Airborne Contagion Assessment Ventilation Alarms System and QIDC
The initial research will focus on a large University Campus.
4. Ventilation Test and Evaluation Applied Research Project
All across the country facility managers have been asked to address their ventilation needs. However, all they are able to do is to comply with local codes typically driven by existing standards. Facility managers have found that old buildings from the 1920's, 30s, 40s, and 50s that were retrofitted in the past have great ventilation far surpassing modern buildings and existing standards. Facility ventilation levels have been dropping since the energy crisis in the 1970's. When cigarette smoking was banned, once again, facility ventilation dropped. Recently sustainability requirements rolling out across the country are further lowering ventilation levels in buildings. Evidence suggests that respiratory diseases are a result of these massive engineering trends. We now have COVID-19 and it appears that it will be endemic and we must determine new ventilation rates that must be placed into new standards moving forward.
The testing in this research project uses operational room settings that physically represent the real world as closely as possible. The purpose of the testing is to examine various virus mitigation approaches (mechanical, UV, ION, Natural, etc.) and quantify the results in the same way that the results are quantified for Goldberg Drum and other test approaches except, once again, the testing uses real world operational rooms and settings.
The testing continuously releases virus or simulated virus into a room with sufficient levels so that test instrumentation can gather data and develop results. This is contrary to most other testing where a space is subjected to contagion for a short period of time (step function) and then decay rates and aerosol cloud paths are observed. The continuous release of a contagion represents a real-world operational setting.
The intent is to establish a set of standard tests that can be consistently performed across all operational settings. Each test will measure the contagion load as a function of time in various locations in a room with various total ACH levels and report the minimum, maximum, and average virus load readings in a summary table.
There is an existing body of work that this research will build upon and it is located at: Proposed Ventilation Test and Evaluation Program
The initial focus of this research is University Facilities.
Applied Research and Development
Fundamental research or pure research is research that everyone acknowledges may not lead to immediate benefits other than increasing the body of knowledge in a particular area. Fundamental research tends to be performed in universities and non-profit organizations with a research charter. Fundamental research is vetted by peers that are spread across the world. Publication is how fundamental research is vetted. This process by its very nature is slow. Because this vetting is long and complex it is critical to ensure that the research is backed up by significant amounts of data. One mistake in the data will cause the research to go back to the beginning of the publication and vetting process. This delay can take years so years are spent internally vetting the research to ensure that it is rock solid.
Applied Reseach and Development
|
Applied research deals with solving practical problems. These problems may be the result of market analysis or other system needs analysis. It also may be the result of inspiration while engaged in or examining fundamental research. However, the purpose of applied research is always to further some practical goal. This is in contrast to basic fundamental research, which is to discover new phenomena or new ideas of general interest.
In the last century companies had applied research labs that fed the industrial base with the next generation markets and products. The labs were shed and disconnected from companies that provided these labs with revenue streams but more importantly a connection to the production and distribution challenges [1]. Today it is believed that venture capital firms and angel investors fill this void, however that is a severe misconception [2]. These entities are only interested in revenue streams NOT solving problems and creating new markets. That is why it has taken so long for new climate change products and systems to surface. What would have been a trivial applied research project in the last century that would lead to new products and systems is now a massive challenge because there are no funding sources and more importantly no ability to quickly organize appropriate capability to quickly complete the applied research and begin development.
As the applied research labs were shed from the companies, more research dollars appeared in the Universities. The big question is what is the role of Universities in applied research? For example can a University take on the proposed research projects in this section? If not the Universities, then who? Venture capital is not interested in these types of projects. Companies are not interested in these types of projects. Yet there is a strong need for these projects as evidenced by the COVID-19 disaster that shutdown whole societies for 2 years [1].
Applied Research Labs
Applied research labs were funded and controlled by companies in the previous century. They provided products and systems that addressed the massive needs of the commercial and industrial base that resulted in our modern civilization. The following is a small sampling of the contributions from these research labs.
RCA Laboratories (1941-1988). David Sarnoff Research Center in the Princeton vicinity was laid just before the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. That facility, later Sarnoff Corporation headquarters, was the site of several historic developments, including color television, CMOS integrated circuit technology and electron microscopy. When RCA was dismantled the RCA Labs were spun off as Sarnoff Corporation in 1988. The Sarnoff Corporation was fully integrated into SRI in January 2011. [1]
Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925-1984). In the late 19th century, the laboratory began as the Western Electric Engineering Department and was located at 463 West Street in New York City. In 1925, after years of conducting research and development under Western Electric, the Engineering Department was reformed into Bell Telephone Laboratories and under the shared ownership of American Telephone & Telegraph Company and Western Electric. Researchers working at Bell Labs are credited with the development of radio astronomy, the transistor, the laser, the photovoltaic cell, the charge-coupled device (CCD), information theory, the Unix operating system, and the programming languages C, C++, and S. [1]
HRL Laboratories (formerly Hughes Research Laboratories). Formerly the research arm of Hughes Aircraft. In the 1940s, Howard Hughes created a R&D facility in Culver City, California. In 1959 construction started on the headquarters located on a Malibu hilltop overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The modernist white and glass building was designed by Los Angeles architect Ernest Lee. The headquarters was built by the Del E. Webb Construction Company, who built several facilities for Hughes. The laboratory opened in 1960. In 1984 the U.S. Federal Courts declared in a court case that the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, in order to retain its non-profit status, must divest itself of Hughes Aircraft Company and subsidiaries. General Motors purchased Hughes Aircraft in 1985. GM sold the Hughes aerospace and defense operations to Raytheon in 1997, and spun off Hughes Research Laboratories (legally renamed "HRL Laboratories, LLC"), with GM and Raytheon as co-owners. GM sold the Hughes satellite operations to Boeing in 2000, and the co-owners became Boeing, GM, and Raytheon. In 2007, Raytheon decided to sell its stake, though it still maintains research and contractual relations with HRL. The first working model of the laser was created at Hughes Research Laboratories in 1960. HRL began research on atomic clocks in 1959. In the late 1970s they produced experimental maser oscillators for NRL, which eventually led to space-based GPS atomic clocks. HRL began research on ion propulsion in 1960. This research led to the Hughes developed xenon ion propulsion system. [1]
Hughes Aircraft. Many do not realize that Hughes Aircraft entire work effort was applied research and development. Production of new systems would be performed by build to print companies including aircraft companies like Lockheed in the early years. The credits to Hughes Aircraft include satellites, space probes, remote robotics, massive command and control systems, computing, sensors, neural networks, the first application of engineering to software development, systems practices, systems engineering. television projection displays, LCD displays, satellite based consumer television, electronics impervious to radiation (space environment), gigahurtz chips for communications and computing (public circa 1980's), fiberoptics, and the list goes on. Many attempt to imprint todays rich with the massive accomplishments of Howard Hughes and Hughes Aircraft. They have nothing in common with Howard Hughes. Howard applied his initial wealth to satisfy the needs of the time and the needs that he addressed were challenges that no one would touch with a ten foot pole. He was an engineer that worked in his labs with his people on breakthrough systems that mattered. Those values and that culture were passed to the entire Hughes Aircraft corporation and lasted until it was dismantled in the 1980s. The result was massive breakthrough applied research in every area that transformed our world. [1] [more information including a list of the groups, labs, and divisions is found in Sustainable Development Possible With Creative Systems Engineering]
Other Applied Research Labs. There are other applied research labs that were once part of companies meeting commercial and industrial needs. They include Texas Instruments, Hewlett-Packard, Xerox, Kodak and many others. Some of these companies still exist however everyone must understand that they no longer support massive Applied Research and Development as the business landscape was transformed to minimize all risk and maximize short term profits even if it means reduced revenues and a dead business base because the need has shifted away to other areas. [1]
SRI International. SRI is an American nonprofit scientific research institute and organization headquartered in Menlo Park, California. The trustees of Stanford University established SRI in 1946 as a center of innovation to support economic development in the region. SRI was not attached to any business concern. SRI's focus areas include biomedical sciences, chemistry and materials, computing, Earth and space systems, economic development, education and learning, energy and environmental technology, security and national defense, as well as sensing and devices. [1] SIRI came from SRI not the companies that use SIRI. SRI was researching and applying voice recognition and synthesis since 1980 if not earlier.
References
[1] COVID-19 A Systems Perspective, Walter Sobkiw, 2021, ISBN 9780983253044, hardback.
[2] The Secret History of Silicon Valley, Steve Blank, www.steveblank.com . https://steveblank.com/secret-history, 2023.
In 2005 Cassbeth developed a tool to analyze specifications (SAT) that evolved to include analyzing all other documents (GDA). It was used used to analyze multiple policy documents including documents associated with global warming like the Stern Review and U.S. global warming policy documents. [1] [2] [3] [4] GDA was used in 2023 to analyze the Drexel University 2021-2022 course catalog [5] that is available on their website for courses associated in some form with climate change. The PDF files were converted to MS word files and then saved as text files. The reports are at the following links:
Note: At the link scroll down to Analysis Results, also look at the Metrics.
Graduate
Quarter Courses 170 courses but 3 are false positives,
6
climate change courses .
All
Hits By Department
Undergraduate
Quarter Courses 149 courses but 4 are false positives,
15
climate change courses .
All
Hits By Department
Graduate
Semester Courses 11 courses .
All
Hits By Department
Undergraduate
Semester Courses 0 courses .
All
Hits By Department 1 course
There are a total of 333 courses related to climate change and 21 climate change courses. There are probably missed results and more false positives. Typically this analysis iterates with multiple passes of rule updates based on each new analysis pass. This analysis made only one pass. The General Document Analysis (GDA) tool is available for free. GDA information and download.
There are 2 other Drexel catalogs that are available for analysis and they are associated with engineering courses. There will be some overlap with the full catalogs but it appears that there are more courses listed in the engineering catalogs. This analysis used text files saved directly from the PDF. This unbundled the table row entries that were found in these PDF files into standalone lines rather than a single line. This allowed each course to be identified.
Graduate
Quarter Engineering Courses 31 courses but 4 are false positives.
Majors
and Courses .
All
Hits By Majors
Undergraduate
Quarter Engineering Courses 87 courses but 10 are false positives.
Majors
and Courses .
All
Hits By Majors
There are 104 engineering courses related to sustainable development but 0 climate change courses.
The next question is how many courses are associated with ventilation and airborne contagions.
Ventilation
Graduate Quarter 2 ventilation and 6 infection related hits / courses
by department
Ventilation
Undergraduate Quarter 4 ventilation and 3 infection related hits / courses
by department
Ventilation
Graduate Semester 1 ventilation and 10 infection related hits /
courses by department
There are 7 ventilation hits / courses and 19 infection related hits / courses.
Compared to sustainable development and climate change there are very few courses associated with ventilation and airborne infections.
References
[1] Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), 2006. https://models.pbl.nl/image/index.php/IPCC,_2006
[2] GREEN PAPER A European Strategy for Sustainable, Competitive and Secure Energy, COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES, Brussels, 8.3.2006. https://europa.eu/documents/comm/green_papers/pdf/com2006_105_en.pdf
[3] Stern Review: The Economics of Climate Change, 30 October 2006, release by Her Majesty’s Treasury of the UK Government. Published in January 2007 by Cambridge University Press. https://biotech.law.lsu.edu/blog/sternreview_report_complete.pdf
[4] U.S. Climate Change Technology Program STRATEGIC PLAN, U.S. Department of Energy (Lead-Agency), September 2006. https://downloads.globalchange.gov/cctp/CCTP-StratPlan-Sep-2006.pdf
[5] Drexel University Course Catalog 2021-2022, https://deptapp08.drexel.edu/catalog/archive/2021-archives-index.htm, 2023.
[6] K-12 Ventilation Lesson Plans, Cassbeth, 2023. K-12 course content.
Climate Change University Masters Degree Programs
The following is a sampling of climate change masters degree programs. The text descriptions of the programs are selected extracts from the respective websites.
Australian National University Master of Climate Change
Choosing a Master of Climate Change at Australia's national university equips you with the knowledge and understanding to tackle one of the world’s most vital challenges. It is the ideal degree if your current role intersects with climate issues and you are seeking to broaden and deepen your knowledge to move up to the next career level. And there is no better qualification if you are transitioning professionally and looking for a career change that enables you to make a real difference. You will study core topics such as: domestic and international climate policy and economics; climate change science and policy including vulnerability and adaptation; and research methods for complex environmental problems and environmental management. Choose from electives in climatology, ecological systems, sustainable development, resource management, economic approaches, law and engineering.
Northern Arizona University Master’s in Climate Science & Solutions
The Climate Science & Solutions (CSS) Professional Science Master’s program combines a foundation of climate science and sustainable systems studies with professional training and organizational skills to help graduates succeed in the growing climate industry. Meet our Faculty & Staff or check out program highlights below.
NAU is a leader in higher education for sustainability and a founding signee of the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment (ACUPCC) and the Second Nature Carbon Pledge in 2007. NAU is proud of the City of Flagstaff Climate Emergency Declaration and its leadership within our community. We are focused on community engagement to ensure that we create a plan that reflects the current needs of our greater campus community.
Antioch University MS in RMA, Sustainable Development and Climate Change
The Sustainable Development and Climate Change (SDCC) is a trans-disciplinary program of study that prepares students to take a leadership role in managing and coordinating the required resources to address the complex environmental challenges in the context of a changing climate.
London School of Economics and Political Science MSc Environmental Economics and Climate Change
This programme aims to deliver a well-developed understanding of the economics, science and policies associated with climate change, as well as a broad foundation in environmental and resource economics. It delves into the conceptual economic foundations and the practical tools of analysis, including state-of-the-art quantitative methods.
University of Oxford MSc in Environmental Change and Management
The MSc aims to give you a broad appreciation of the major processes of environmental change and of the people and institutions involved in environmental management. The course seeks to produce environmental leaders who are interdisciplinary and analytical in their approach to environmental issues, and competent and aware decision makers.
UC San Diego Multiple Programs
Environmental Systems Program: Four majors and a minor are available to prepare undergraduates to enter a broad spectrum of environmental careers and graduate programs in natural sciences, social sciences, public policy, law and business.
Climate Change Studies Minor: This minor degree program provides an understanding of climate change's scientific, social, political and economic dimensions. It involves students in developing solutions such as greenhouse gas mitigation strategies, climate adaptation projects and educational approaches.
Climate Change and Human Solutions Major: This innovative major focuses on the social and cultural processes associated with climate change. It gives students the knowledge, real-world skills and hands-on learning opportunities to collaborate with communities in designing solutions that work.
Climate Action Scholars Program: This School of Social Sciences initiative provides a two-course sequence examining the historical, structural and cultural roots of the climate crisis, its effects across diverse communities and ecologies and the creative ways local people respond and build collective resilience.
Program for Interdisciplinary Environmental Research (PIER): This minor degree program provides an understanding of climate change's scientific, social, political and economic dimensions. It involves students in developing solutions such as greenhouse gas mitigation strategies, climate adaptation projects and educational approaches.
Cornell CALS Climate Change and Agriculture MPS Concentration
The Climate Change and Agriculture concentration within the Integrative Plant Science MPS provides a solid foundation in the diverse sciences we need to solve the greatest challenge of our times. You will learn about climate science, climate change mitigation and adaptation with respect to global cropping systems and sustainable development, biogeochemistry, soil nutrient and carbon cycling, and science policy. You will become proficient in handling and analyzing remote sensing data and in ecosystem modeling. Your experience and skills will help you stand out from the crowd when searching for climate change related positions in government, NGO and private sectors.
This brief review of courses suggests that there are no courses addressing the tradeoffs, challenges, and approaches to maximize healthy ventilation and minimize carbon footprint.
There is an interesting Drexel University course that surfaced in the analysis:
PSY 352 Psychology of Sustainability. In this course, we will examine the multidisciplinary study of the interrelationship between human behavior and the natural, built, and social environments. We will address how psychological theory and research is applicable to promoting a sustainable future and explore psychological aspects of the reciprocal relationship between humans and the rest of the natural world.
This is an interesting find because there is a psychology of ventilation that should be explored based on the COVID-19 Research From a Systems Perspective findings. The details will be offered in section: Psychology of Ventilation. It is a long and complex finding.
This begs the question: should there be K-12 course content associated with Healthy Ventilation to teach this new generation what their grandparents knew after the flu epidemic at the start of the 20th century and should it be linked with existing climate change content? The suggestion is yes because healthy ventilation and climate change tools like reduced CO2 levels and technologies are linked. The following is a list of potential K-12 Ventilation Lesson Plans that can be applied in classroom settings and as part of STEM activities associated with ventilation.
SYSVE-101 Fresh Air. This lesson will introduce the students to air. They will learn that we breathe in oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide while plants use our carbon dioxide and release oxygen. We use oxygen to live and plants use carbon dioxide to live. They will learn that air consists of other gasses, dust, plant pollen and micro organisms some of which can make us sick. They will learn about sources of fresh air so that we stay healthy. Grades 1-3. Duration: 1hr/day for 3 days, total 3 hrs.
SYSVE-102 Anemometers. This lesson will introduce the students to anemometers. The students will learn about instruments that measure ventilation rates with a focus on anemometers. They will learn how to use anemometers and the information that they provide. They will measure wind speeds using anemometers and they will be shown how they can use anemometers to measure ventilation levels in a room. Grades 4-7. Duration: 1hr/day for 3 days, total 3 hrs.
SYSVE-103 Fresh Air Schools. This lesson will introduce the students to fresh air schools from the 1900s. The students will learn about the fresh air school movement from the early 1900s and how these schools helped children with tuberculosis. The students will become aware of the impact of fresh air schools on the introduction of forced air heating and cooling to lower the spread of indoor airborne infections. They will become aware of different school architectures and the ventilation challenges of new schools and the desire to reduce carbon foot prints. Grades 4-5, 6-12. Duration: 1hr/day for 3 days, total 3 hrs.
SYSVE-104 Natural Ventilation. This lesson will introduce the students to natural ventilation. The students will learn how natural ventilation works and where it is best applied. They will be exposed to different building architectures that use natural ventilation. The students will learn what to expect in terms of Air Changes Per Hour (ACH) from natural ventilation and how it can be measured. Grades 6-8, 9-12. Duration: 1hr/day for 3 days total 3 hrs.
SYSVE-105 Measuring Mechanical Ventilation Rates. This lesson will introduce the students to mechanical ventilation. The students will learn how mechanical ventilation works. They will be exposed to different mechanical ventilation vents and grills and different mechanical ventilation approaches. The students will learn what to expect in terms of Air Changes Per Hour (ACH) from mechanical ventilation and how it can be measured. Grades 4-5, 6-8, 9-12. Duration: 1hr/day for 3 days total 3 hrs.
SYSVE-106 Capturing School Classroom ventilation data. This lesson will introduce the students to mechanical ventilation. The students will learn how mechanical ventilation works. They will be exposed to different mechanical ventilation vents and grills and different mechanical ventilation approaches. The students will learn what to expect in terms of Air Changes Per Hour (ACH) from mechanical ventilation and how it can be measured. The students will work in teams to produce a final report that documents ventilation performance. Grades 9-12. Duration: 1hr/day for 3 days total 3 hrs.
SYSVE-107 Ventilation Approaches and Sustainability. This lesson will introduce the students to ventilation approaches and their impacts on sustainability. The students will learn the various energy demands from various ventilation approaches. Students will be exposed to the concept of internal and external sustainability. The students will engage in a team activity to discuss what they think should happen with ventilation in this century. Grades 9-12. Duration: 1hr/day for 3 days total 3 hrs. Prerequisite: SYSVE-105 or SYSVE-106
Lesson plans are available upon request at: K-12 Ventilation Lesson Plans.
Climate change and facility ventilation share the same characteristics of being distant, invisible, and seeming to not directly affect the individual. In the case of climate change there is massive evidence presented in the public media that something is happening. It is easy for people to see and process the images of the negative effects of climate change. In the case of facility ventilation there is massive scientific and empirical evidence but it is not in the public media. The only aspect that is in the public media is the COVID-19 disaster. The COVID-19 disaster was directly heavily influenced by poor ventilation [1], but the connection is not in the mass mind or in the people charged with ensuring that facilities minimize health risks and deaths from those health risks.
The following are excerpts from VENTILATION: WHY does no one take it seriously [2]?
Excerpt Start
VENTILATION: WHY does no one take it seriously?
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8251269
companies in this field did not have good ventilation in their offices,
professors did not have it in their offices at all.
And today, the ventilation in new offices is still poor, and many have no ventilation.
200-300 universities lecturing about HVAC, but no one lecturer has a well-ventilated office.
The main thinking must be that ventilation may be needed in some industries or hospital settings. And even when it is needed, ventilation can be easily managed by opening windows.
Is ventilation being taught adequately?
most of the world, energy has been the top priority. And ventilation has always been seen as having a negative impact (as it means more energy being consumed).
The main problem is that ventilation has been mainly seen as an engineering problem, but in reality, it is a public health topic.
What was discussed ... in 1974? We had to reduce energy use in buildings, and the easiest way is to reduce ventilation. How to do it?
Natural ventilation needs no energy for fans, so perhaps that is the best solution? Sadly, natural ventilation has difficulties for controlling building tightness, with openings for inlet and outlet, controlled by wind speed and direction, and the temperature difference between indoor and outdoor. In reality, this means that the natural ventilation rate may be too high in a cold climate.
Mechanical ventilation is a very simple system with ducts, fans, and perhaps filters.
The main problem with such systems is that they need good design and maintenance.
So mechanical ventilation did not work, as no one cared about it. Just installing ducts and fans, …… and filters, that are not properly checked.
Can you trust an HVAC engineer?
ventilation is something that some companies make money on (by selling ducts, filters, fans…), but no one seems to realize, as I have, that it is important to make it work.
NO ONE CARES.
And of course, today ... students are not taught properly about ventilation.
universities with HVAC education…. [but have] NO functioning VENTILATION…
I am sorry I ever got into "ventilation"… no one takes it seriously!
Jan Sundell,
Former Editor-in-Chief of Indoor AirI received this editorial contribution by email from our former Editor-in-Chief, Jan Sundell, on February 17, 2019. Jan probably wrote it from his hospital bed. To my regret, I did not submit his editorial on his behalf earlier. Indoor Air published an editorial "In Memory of Professor Jan Sundell (July 10, 1943-May 27, 2019)" (Indoor Air. 2019; 29:701-703). What would he do if he were with us in the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic? He warned us of the risk of poor ventilation in his life, in his publications, in his presentations, and during his many conversations with many of us. Why weren't we ready? While the world is combating the pandemic, I sincerely recommend this editorial to our readers for us to remember Jan’s life, work, and friendship on his second death anniversary.
Yuguo Li,
Editor-in-Chief of Indoor AirJan’s words ring so true in our Time of COVID-19. Over the summer of 2020, we assisted local school districts struggling to reopen. We found building management systems were dysfunctional, unit ventilators in a classroom being used as an extra shelf space with vents covered, and a basic lack of understanding about the importance of ventilation. Sadly, the only reliable way to provide a safe environment was to install supplemental air cleaners to provide higher clean air delivery.
In our current Aviation Public Health Initiative with airlines, airports, and aircraft manufacturers, we again had to demonstrate the importance of ventilation as a critical mitigation strategy, particular when mask wearing, and physical distancing were not enough. It took the evidence from measurements we made on airplanes and terminal buses to convince the air carriers and airport operators of the importance of ventilation. We made the case that high ventilation rates needed to be maintained throughout the gate-to-gate time on a plane.
Jan had a huge influence on our field on Indoor Science. He always seemed to be ahead of many of us. His influence is still present. My doctoral student Jose Cedeno demonstrated higher use of University Health Services for respiratory illnesses was associated with high occupancy of dorms. The earlier work of Jan and his colleagues at Tianjin University inspired us.
Jan’s living legacy and testimony to his vision and persistence are the China Children Health and Housing studies conducted in numerous Chinese cities. He has inspired a generation of students and young investigators to appreciate the health implications of indoor environments.
Jan’s friend, Jack Spengler,
Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health,
CambridgeJan was an extraordinary person. It is seen in the above text, probably one of his very last. He was a philosopher, yet a very pragmatic one. He did not follow the mainstream and had his opinions; they made you think. This is how I remember him when we first met in 1996, and he talked about the lost TVOC. Jan was passionate about public health. His passion was ventilation and big data, besides good jazz and few other things. He taught me (us) how to read and use scientific literature. His series of multidisciplinary reviews, unique at that time, laid the ground for new scientific developments. Jan wanted to collect big data. He believed that by monitoring in many places we would learn more. He launched studies in Europe, America, and Asia. Today, big data is a buzzword; back then, it was much more difficult to implement when he started. But he tried and made it happen. Jan had a special contact with students and young scientists; he promoted and introduced them to the big scientific world. I am privileged to be one of them. Jan believed that multidisciplinary research and especially focus on health were a way forward for indoor air field. We see today he was absolutely right. If only we had followed his advice on ventilation back then, we would be much better off today. We miss him….
Pawel Wargocki,
Technical University of Denmark, Lyngby,
President, ISIAQ Academy of Fellows
Excerpt End
The following are some case histories that have been captured with the COVID-19 Research From a Systems Perspective. It is not a complete list but it shows the challenges.
Case History Proposed Legislation: In 2020 CassBeth provided legislation to address the ventilation problems detected with the COVID-19 disaster. It was ignored until the Biden administration took office but the only aspect of the legislation that was adopted was the proposed funding of $110 billion to upgrade school ventilation systems. The money was provided with no oversight or regulations. As a result friends, relatives, and sales people sold snake oil to many school districts that did not address the poor ventilation levels.
This is a portion of the proposed legislation text:
The purpose of this legislation is to provide the funding to develop existing and new engineering based ventilation approaches and perform a ventilation test and evaluation effort using the best science and engineering available to determine what must be done to facilities to ensure that they are safe and potential virus infection is fully mitigated. It is anticipated that the engineering solutions are off the shelf and the primary effort will be in ventilation test and evaluation so that government certified specifications can be developed and then offered to the industrial base for implementations. The government certification will ensure that the best science and engineering has been used and that all legal liability issues are fully addressed so that industry can provide the safe solutions.
In order to allow schools to safely open as soon as possible, a minimum of $110 billion dollars shall be initially allocated to fund the upgrade of all public schools using the results of this effort.
Case History Venture Capital: In 2023 CassBeth attended multiple venture capital venues to determine interest in an IP and prototype that alerts occupants to ventilation hazards like smoke detectors alert occupants to fire hazards. The venture capital community clearly stated over multiple meetings - we don't care what your product does all we care about is do you have a business model. Never mind addressing a critical need that shut down the world for 2 years. There was no interest, there was only interest in the latest hot tropic - AI. CassBeth concluded that the venture capital system was in the business of monetizing pet rocks not addressing critical needs with their access to massive capital and resources. The world I grew up in and provided my modern civilization did not care about business models and we knew it when we saw the Pet Rock sold in the 1970's suggesting as the previous generation knew - anything can be sold and money can be made on anything even a bucket of shit. Sorry for the strong language but that was the phrase used time and time again and that is why engineering and science was held in such regard - because engineering and science was known to be the long pole in the tent - it was hard. Monetizing, business models, and sales were viewed as trivial exercises. Yes you need people that know what they are doing but that is all that is needed - let the pet rock and shit sales begin. This last part of the assessment is beyond the ventilation mass mind challenges but is is equally important. It hits at the heart of our ability to quickly solve critical problems like the collision between climate change and ventilation. There is more discussion on this topic at: Systems Perspective.
Case History General Public: In 2023 CassBeth presented ventilation findings at a venue at Temple University to a general public audience. It was a classroom setting that had a fabulous view and school unit ventilators the length of 2 walls. Upon arrival the unit ventilators were turned off, they were turned on, were very quiet, and provided massive ventilation as the large air movement was felt with the hand. CassBeth presented its COVID-19 ventilation findings and the audience was impressed. It was pointed out that the classroom unit ventilators were off upon entry into the room and that Cassbeth turned them on using the manual rotary switch. No one in the audience turned to look at the unit ventilators. No one asked questions about the unit ventilators. The audience was essentially dead to the topic of ventilation even though they were directly put at risk at that venue but the facility had the proper infrastructure and the presenters knew what to do upon arrival in the room.
Case History Healthcare Workers Ignored: In 2023 CassBeth attended multiple venues and occasionally would meet healthcare workers. They all understood the connection between ventilation and airborne infection control. However, they were unable to affect needed changes in their facilities. They were all showing signs of the monkey in the cage syndrome - they were beaten back by their management chains. This personally affected a Cassbeth member who attended a healthcare facility with a family member. The healthcare facility had the ventilation turned off. It is part of a major regional healthcare system and the HVAC system is probably a demand control system that was outsourced to an energy company. The next day a call was received that the facility had a COVID-19 case. The Cassbeth member got COVID-19. Even though the Cassbeth member was fully vaccinated a call was made to the primary care physician and Paxlovid was perscribed. Paxlovid had an immediate positive effect, without it the hospital would have been scenario given the fast rise and severity of the illness (symptoms).
So what are scientists and engineers doing to address this ventilation challenge?
A Paradigm Shift to Combat Indoor Respiratory Infection [3] [4]
In May of 2021, 39 scientists published "A Paradigm Shift to Combat Indoor Respiratory Infection" calling for a paradigm shift in how citizens and government officials think about the quality of the air we breathe indoors. At some point in history this document will be referenced for decades.
ABSTRACT
There is great disparity in the way we think about and address different sources of environmental infection. Governments have for decades promulgated a large amount of legislation and invested heavily in food safety, sanitation, and drinking water for public health purposes. By contrast, airborne pathogens and respiratory infections, whether seasonal influenza or COVID-19, are addressed fairly weakly, if at all, in terms of regulations, standards, and building design and operation, pertaining to the air we breathe. We suggest that the rapid growth in our understanding of the mechanisms behind respiratory infection transmission should drive a paradigm shift in how we view and address the transmission of respiratory infections to protect against unnecessary suffering and economic losses. It starts with a recognition that preventing respiratory infection, like reducing waterborne or foodborne disease, is a tractable problem.
The following are key extracts from the paper, A Paradigm Shift to Combat Indoor Respiratory Infection.
There is great disparity in the way we think about and address different sources of environmental infection. Governments have for decades promulgated a large amount of legislation and invested heavily in food safety, sanitation, and drinking water for public health purposes. By contrast, airborne pathogens and respiratory infections, whether seasonal influenza or COVID-19, are addressed fairly weakly, if at all, in terms of regulations, standards, and building design and operation, pertaining to the air we breathe.
Most modern building construction has occurred subsequent to a decline in the belief that airborne pathogens are important. Therefore, the design and construction of modern buildings make few if any modifications for this airborne risk (other than for specialized medical, research, or manufacturing facilities, for example). Respiratory outbreaks have been repeatedly “explained away” by invoking droplet transmission or inadequate hand hygiene.
For decades, the focus of architects and building engineers was on thermal comfort, odor control, perceived air quality, initial investment cost, energy use, and other performance issues, whereas infection control was neglected. This could in part be based on the lack of perceived risk or on the assumption that there are more important ways to control infectious disease, despite ample evidence that healthy indoor environments with a substantially reduced pathogen count are essential for public health.
It is now known that respiratory infections are caused by pathogens emitted through the nose or mouth of an infected person and transported to a susceptible host.
Although the highest exposure for an individual is when they are in close proximity, community outbreaks for COVID-19 infection in particular most frequently occur at larger distances through inhalation of airborne virus laden particles in indoor spaces shared with infected individuals
There are ventilation guidelines, standards, and regulations to which architects and building engineers must adhere.
None of the documents provide recommendations or standards for mitigating bacteria or viruses in indoor air, originating from human respiratory activities. Therefore, it is necessary to reconsider the objective of ventilation to also address air pollutants linked to health effects and airborne pathogens.
There needs to be a shift in the perception that we cannot afford the cost of control, because economic costs of infections can be massive and may exceed initial infrastructure costs to contain them. The global monthly harm from COVID-19 has been conservatively assessed at $1 trillion ([internal ref]), but there are massive costs of common respiratory infections as well. In the United States alone, the yearly cost (direct and indirect) of influenza has been calculated at $11.2 billion; for respiratory infections other than influenza, the yearly cost stood at $40 billion.
We encourage several critical steps. First and foremost, the continuous global hazard of airborne respiratory infection must be recognized so the risk can be controlled. This has not yet been universally accepted, despite strong evidence to support it and no convincing evidence to refute it.
Comprehensive ventilation standards must be developed by professional engineering bodies. Organizations such as the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers and the Federation of European Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning Associations have ventilation standards, and during the COVID-19 pandemic, they have proposed building and system-related control actions and design improvements to mitigate risk of infection. However, standards must be improved to explicitly consider infection control in their statements of purpose and definitions. New approaches must be developed to encourage implementation of standards (e.g., “ventilation certificates” similar to those that exist for food hygiene certification for restaurants).
The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed how unprepared the world was to respond to it, despite the knowledge gained from past pandemics. A paradigm shift is needed on the scale that occurred when Chadwick’s Sanitary Report in 1842 led the British government to encourage cities to organize clean water supplies and centralized sewage systems. In the 21st century, we need to establish the foundations to ensure that the air in our buildings is clean with a substantially reduced pathogen count, contributing to the building occupants’ health, just as we expect for the water coming out of our taps.
From Time Magazine: If We're Going to Live With COVID-19, It's Time to Clean Our Indoor Air Properly, Edward A. Nardell is Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School.
COVID-variants may be with us for years to come, and this will certainly not be the last respiratory virus pandemic. We have long suffered from annual contagious respiratory infections, but exceptionally low rates of influenza and common colds during COVID-precautions have demonstrated that not all of this suffering need happen. So, we need to think clearly and scientifically about how better we can reduce the spread of viruses indoors especially when and where masks will no longer be in common use.
Are there effective engineering controls that can help make indoor environments truly safer?
Systems Assessment: Ventilation education in context with climate change carbon reduction pressures is needed on a massive scale to avoid illness, death, and potential of future epidemics.
References
[1] COVID-19 A Systems Perspective, Walter Sobkiw, 2021, ISBN 9780983253044, hardback.
[2] VENTILATION: WHY does no one take it seriously? Jan Sundell, Former Editor-in-Chief of Indoor Air. February 17, 2019, Published online 2021 Apr 20. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8251269
[3] A Paradigm Shift to Combat Indoor Respiratory Infection, Science Vol 372, Issue 6543 pp. 689-691, 14 May 2021. webpage https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abg2025, December 2021.
[4] A Paradigm Shift to Combat Indoor Respiratory Infection, University of LEEDS, White Rose Research Online, published 14 May 2021, online August 27, 2021. webpage https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/177405/3/Paradigm%20Shift%20AAM.pdf, https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/177405/, December 2021.
[5] If We’re Going to Live With COVID-19, It’s Time to Clean Our Indoor Air Properly, Edward A Nardell, Harvard Medical School Time, February 1, 2022. https://time.com/6143799/covid-19-indoor-air-cleaning
Solar trees are solar panels put on ground mounted poles designed to look like regular trees. They usually have a single long pole installed into the ground suggesting a tree trunk. The pole holds up solar panels placed together at the very top of the pole or at varying heights and directions just like the branches on a tree. What separates a solar tree from other solar panel systems is its unique artistic design intended to be visually appealing to enhance a pedestrian setting.
Solar Panels is a broad term used by most to suggest solar panel installations on the roofs of buildings or on the ground with minimal attention to artistic display. They tend to be flat structures and when placed on the ground restrict pedestrian movement. They are essentially in restricted spaces.
Solar trees have certain benifts that seperate them from typcal solar panel systems.
The following is a list of potential users and locations for solar trees.
Roof top solar panels and ground based solar panels or solar farms are the majority of installations. The solar efficiency is such that a roof top solar systems will offset the electricity needs of a single story dwelling more or less depending on climate locations. This is a key system relationship because its can be used to quickly determine what the solar electricity benefit might be for multistory buildings. The following is a notional analysis of what the benefit might be for buildings with various numbers of floor levels. The assumptions are:
Number of Floors |
Electricity Produced By |
1 |
100% |
2 |
50% |
3 |
33% |
4 |
25% |
5 |
20% |
6 |
17% |
7 |
14% |
8 |
13% |
9 |
11% |
10 |
10% |
The analysis suggests that there is benefit to a multistory building when roof top solar systems are installed. The tradeoff is the installation cost versus the benefit over time versus the desire for reduced carbon footprint. For example, rather than viewing the rooftop solar system as a replacement for the buildings electricity needs, instead it is viewed as a carbon offset asset.
In 2022 New York City Public Schools introduced no meat Fridays. Unfortunately, the first Vegan Friday was not good. Complaints included comments that the meals served were bland and lacking in color, flavor, and nutrition. Some meals included bags of chips, plain black bean tacos, and wilted veggie stir-fries with little to no protein. However there is a massive revolution in food happening where new plant based food alternatives are transforming the menu landscape. This had an impact.
In 2024 Netflix released the vegan documentary series, You Are What You Eat: A Twin Experiment. Based on an 8-week study conducted by Stanford University, this series tracked 22 sets of genetically identical twins on opposing (but healthy) diets: omnivore and vegan. The film features Wicked Kitchen co-founder Chad Sarno, Miyoko Schinner founder of Miyoko’s Creamery, Daniel Humm, Executive Chef of New York’s Michelin 3-star vegan restaurant, along with other luminaries in the healthy food world. There were also appearances from Eric Adams, the Mayor of New York City and Cory Booker, U.S. Senator from New Jersey. It is in this documentary that the following unexpected system messages surfaced:
According to the United Nations our food systems generate one-third of global greenhouse gas emissions, higher than the global aviation sector. Reducing the global average annual individual carbon footprint from 6.3 tons in 2020 to 2.1 tons in 2030, as recommended by experts, will involve changes to the food system and diet. Having greater awareness and making small changes will not only help reduce greenhouse gas emissions and individual carbon footprint but will improve air quality, health, and save money. Switching to a plant-based diet can reduce an individual’s annual carbon footprint by up to 2.1 tons with a vegan diet or up to 1.5 tons for vegetarians. [3]
A no meat Friday translates to an individuals annual carbon foot print reduction of 0.3 (2.1*52/365) tons or 30 tons per 100 people in an example cafeteria scenario.
References
[1] Plant-Powered Meals, New York City Department of Education. https://www.schools.nyc.gov/school-life/food/school-meals/plant-powered, 2024.
[2] Wicked Kitchen Co-Founder Chad Sarno Featured In Netflix Docuseries "You Are What You Eat", Wicked Foods, January 14, 2024. https://wickedkitchen.com/wicked-kitchen-chad-sarno-featured-in-netflix-docuseries-you-are-what-you-eat/, 2024.
[3] Your guide to climate action: Food, United Nations. https://www.un.org/en/actnow/food, 2024.
Sustainable Development Systems Practices
In 2011 a video was produced for a paper that was presented at an INCOSE technical conference. In 2013 the video was updated and added to a University Level systems engineering course. This video is a good introduction to this area. See Video
Many use the terms sustainability, global warming, and climate change interchangeably even though they each represent different aspects of the challenges. Global warming was used when there was still discussion outside the scientific community of if there is indeed global warming and if human activity is the cause. Today we all know that is a given. Climate change is a subset of sustainability, but it clearly is one of the most important aspects of sustainability today.
The Brundtland Commission defined sustainable development as development that "meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." Sustainable development is usually divided into social, economic, environmental and institutional areas. The social, economic and environmental areas address key principles of sustainability, while the institutional area addresses key policy and capacity issues.
People should try to live well now and in the future. The issue is the mechanisms they have at their disposal to accommodate that life. One of those mechanisms is systems engineering to develop the most effective solution.
It is obvious that systems practices must be used to address the sustainability challenges of this new century, but those not versed in systems practices have other views. For example, product oriented people feel that their products are a perfect fit in a particular niche of sustainability. Technology people think they have a magic technology that will solve a challenging sustainability issue. Financial people think that tax incentives or virtual markets will spur innovation and let business rise to the occasion of various sustainability needs. Systems practitioners believe that systems engineering is the only way to start to chip away at all complex problems including climate change.
In 2011 a paper was provided that described some of the systems practices to consider when addressing sustainability: Systems Practices for Sustainability. [1] The paper is a summary of the content offered in my university level systems courses and my textbooks. [2] [3] [4] The topics in the paper are:
The paper and a presentation is available at: library link . Paper . Presentation . See Video
The textbooks and courses have additional content. The following is a sampling of some of the additional content. It also has updates to reflect tracking carbon loads.
Life Cycle Cost
[3] [4]
Cost shifting is a prctice where the true system costs are shifted to other stakeholers who may be unaware of their new found responsibility. The Life Cycle Cost (LCC) equation is modified to remove any possibility of cost shifting. A suggestion is to consider the followng cost elements to repersent total cost.
LCC = R+D+P+O+M+W+S+T Where:
R = Research
D = Development
P = Production
O = Operation
M = Maintenance
W = Waste
S = Shut Down and Decommissioning
T = Disposal
An alternative view is: LCC = R+D+P+O+M+S+I+E or PROMISED Where:
R = Research
D = Development
P = Production
O = Operation
M = Maintenance
S = Shut Down & Disposal
I = Infrastructure (Indirect)
E = Environment & Waste
Author Comment: Infrastructure (I) represents the cost of establishing the infrastructure so that others can offer system solutions. Examples are government funded research, development, and operations of air traffic control systems and research and development of airplanes for defense that are then transferred to civilian use. In this setting it is absurd to think a commercial airline company is a real business that funds all its costs. It becomes even more absurd when managers of these entities think they should derive revenue by charging for toilet services while in flight. It would be impossible for these companies to exist if the true cost of flying were factored into the business. They could not exist. The same is true of all the businesses that benefit from the rural electrification program, interstate highways, roads, space satellite systems and a plethora of other infrastructure projects that no business could justify in a reasonable business model. But that does not mean the Infrastructure costs should not be identified for various system solutions. To the contrary they should be clearly identified so that a system does not become a burden on the people.
Life Cycle Carbon Load
[New to reflect carbon load tracking]
The LCC equation is based on tracking costs. The same equation concept can be used to track carbon. A suggestion is to consider the followng carbon load elements to repersent total carbon load.
LCCL = M+P+D+O+M+W+S+T Where:
M = Mining
P = Production
D = Distribution
O = Operation
M = Maintenance
W = Waste
S = Shut Down and Decommissioning
T = Disposal
A key observation is that Carbon load is directly related to energy, electrical power, and thus costs.
LCCL ~ Power ~ Costs
In order to prevent erroneous results in some cases, the power load should be used as the tracking unit. For example, a building deciding to purchase from green energy companies and then claiming lower carbon levels is just an accounting trick. The building was not updated to actually reduce its carbon load and it should not be rated with the lower green carbon load. Green power is distributed across the entire infrastructure and it benefits the entire infrastructure equally. This is actually a compromised system approach subverting the actual system goal. It's a compromised management trick to address the carbon load stakeholders and they have become unsuspecting victims of cost shifting or in this case carbon shifting.
This does not mean that organizations should not source green power. This sourcing with higher utility bills is a way to finance green power alternatives and allow the infrastructure to transition to new systems. That is how it should be communicated and claimed.
Internal versus External System Sustainability
[3] [4]
Internal system sustainability is the ability of a system to sustain itself. Bad systems should fail and disappear, however what should a people do if good systems fail and disappear. There are system designs in every aspect of our society filling key needs. These designs have evolved and matured through the ages. On Earth many of the solutions use designs from all our ages. As we look at our modern world we need to understand it is not a measure of the state of the entire planet. As a result we as a species are not operating at our full potential.
Who decides the difference between a good and a bad system? For example what if the clean safe water delivery systems in the U.S. were permitted to fail and go away to be replaced with bottled water? All communities have a maturity level and it should never be assumed that a community can sustain its' current level of existence without serious effort.
External sustainability is a measure of a systems impact on its surrounding community. This is the traditional ecological view of sustainability. Some will point to a scale where one balances the other, however it is not an either or proposition. The easy way out is totally unacceptable. Somehow internal and external sustainability must be addressed.
It is easy to slip into simple economic views of the problem. However stepping back and doing things like drawing simple context diagrams and then attempting to go into the context diagrams may yield important insights.
The key new ideas are:
New Sustainability Performance Requirements
[3] [4]
In keeping with the system practice of identifying new measures of performance for new systems or new views of systems, new performance requirements should be surfaced when addressing sustainability. The following is a suggested list of new sustainability performance requirements. They are based on key ratios associated with any product or system. The ratios use the expected load on the system. So first the loads are calculated, then the key ratios are determined. The sustainability performance loads are as follows:
These loads should be minimized in the system. In addition the system should be in balance. To maintain this balance key ratios also should be minimized. The sustainability performance ratios are:
Example: Unsustainable Packaging
The goal is to minimize the total sustainability performance loads and the sustainability performance ratios in the system. For example, if the total load of PEC + TEC + CEC is minimized and yet the packaging is so small that the content is "less" than the package, then the question must be asked - is the system violating basic common sense related to sustainability? The following is a list of packaging practices and their characteristics:
Once multiplied by millions or hundreds of millions this translates into enormous waste of resources and can be measured as high PCER and PCCR ratios.
Example: Unsustainable Transport
Does it make sense to manufacture an item and transport it across a continent or around the world? The high TCER and TCCR ratios clearly show the sustainable approach. So how did we get into a situation where products are constantly moving across the planet? This is a difficult question and fundamental to the question of being systems driven or finance driven.
In the U.S. during the early 1970's there was a significant argument against the new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) because the new environmental regulations the EPA needed to enforce were encouraging rust belt industries to relocate to countries with little or no environmental regulations. This was the start of offshore production and one of the major reasons for new trends against government bureaucracy and its role in U.S. society.
In a perfect world the financial analysis results would match the system analysis results. However in an imperfect world with artificial markets and indirect cost shifting we see our current state of affairs. The system analysts can build the models, perform the analysis and show the inefficiency in the markets and its impact on sustainability. It is then up to policy makers to determine how to proceed.
Example: Think Local Production and Distribution
Reducing energy and carbon ratios translates into local production and distribution of products. The issue is how to factor the true costs of producing a product into a mechanism so that location and distribution is not driven by the most clever scheme of offsetting indirect costs but the lowest impact on the whole system. This is an example of making sure the context diagram is large enough to represent the true system and not some artificial boundary driven by a limited set of stakeholders.
One approach is to clearly attempt to measure the performance of a product and its impact on the whole system. The TCER, TCCR, PCER, and PCCR are relatively easy to calculate. The issue is what to do once the performance numbers are produced. Policy makers may force a tax or consumers might choose to purchase based on the ratios. Then there is the question of how to validate the claimed ratios.
The simple act of just thinking local might be all that is needed, but that does not necessarily mean a local production facility has the lowest ratios. It may help a people with regulations such as the U.S. but it is of little use to a people with little or no regulations.
Financial Metrics and Value
[3] [4]
Financial metrics falls under the broad area of economics. They are based on two important economic principles: (1) Fixed and Variable Costs, and (2) Supply Versus Demand. Everyone is familiar with financial metrics and many erroneously believe all decisions should be based exclusively on one or more of these financial metrics. Examples of financial metrics are:
However, value is not only financial but also non-financial. For example, some value a day at the beach more than a day at the mountains. How do you capture the value of a bridge that connects two cities? How do you capture the value of a road that heads into a wilderness? These are interesting questions and they were addressed in the last century.
There is a technique that is based on a simple concept - value is more than apparent financial results. Apparent because it is all relative to your context or view. For example, it might make sense to do something because it can translate into thousands of jobs or it can cause people to view a physical land area as attractive so they will move there and buy houses and or open businesses. These can be reduced to dollar numbers but it is more complex . It uses the following elements:
Architecture Identification Tradeoffs and Selection
[3] [4]
At some point architecture alternatives, tradeoffs, and selection need to be addressed. Are there any unique tradeoff criteria to consider when selecting an architecture? How can the architectures be depicted? What process can be reasonably followed to select the architecture especially when sustainability surfaces? The following is a list of possible new sustainable related criteria to consider in architecture development:
To start the process, identify the architecture alternatives. The identification includes the name of the architecture, a simple picture and a few words that capture the essence of the architecture approach. This is limited to a single page for each architecture approach.
Sustainable Architecture Depiction - Sankey Diagram |
What should be considered in the architecture of a power generation system for a community? If the focus is on a new wind farm that will produce power does it make sense to use one type of wind turbine in a homogeneous system or should the system solution use multiple sizes and types of wind turbines in a heterogeneous architecture arrangement? Should the architecture use different energy generation technologies? What are the maintenance and support impacts of heterogeneous architectures and are they mitigated by the advantages?
Identifying the architecture alternatives, surfacing the tradeoff criteria and selecting the most effective architecture is one of the most important practices in systems engineering. It is especially important when questions of sustainability surface.
The following discussion includes a description of the steps to perform when performing this analysis and so at times it reads like an instructions manual.
Value Systems
When there are different architecture alternatives what methods can be used to pick the best approach? Within this question is the concept of value systems. There are different value systems that can be used to make a selection; most of them based on financial metrics. However, there is an alternative to using strictly financial metrics to make a selection. Except for the MOE, the following is a list of financial value systems.
Although most are familiar with various financial value systems, many outside the systems engineering community are not familiar with the Measure of Effectiveness (MOE) that can be calculated with each architecture approach. The Architecture MOE is the sum of the tradeoff ratings divided by the total cost or LCC.
MOE = Sum of Tradeoff Criteria / Total Cost or LCC
The Architecture MOE moves the architecture selection discussion to a different level. One solution might be lowest cost, another highest cost, and yet a third with a mid-level cost. The same applies to the tradeoff rating where one solution might have the highest rating, another the lowest, and yet a third with a middle rating. The most effective solution is the one with the best Architecture MOE. The MOE represents the greatest benefit per dollar spent.
Advantages Disadvantages List
In the beginning of the architecture trade study there is nothing, just a blank sheet of paper. The first step is to identify architecture alternatives, no matter how bizarre. One of the alternatives is the current approach. Another alternative is the dream approach. They form two extremes. The other approaches are everything in between. The alternatives are listed on a single sheet of paper and two columns are added. They are labeled advantages and disadvantages.
This is kept on a single sheet of paper so it can be easily visualized allowing the analysts to quickly get to the key issues. The objective is to minimize irrelevant information and quickly cut down on the alternatives. If there are only two alternatives, something is wrong. If there are ten alternatives, something is wrong. The answer is in between, and should include the impossible alternatives.
List of Advantages Disadvantages
|
The advantages-disadvantages or pluses-minuses tables are very important. It is at this time that the key tradeoff criteria start to surface. These tradeoff criteria are used in the next phase of the architecture trade study.
Sustainability Tradeoff Criteria
Using the advantages and disadvantages table, start to surface tradeoff criteria that naturally flow into the tradeoff matrix. Although there are tradeoff criteria unique to sustainability, the architecture tradeoff should still consider system relevant criteria. These criteria can be general and applicable to any architecture.
The following are General Tradeoff Criteria:
| Resilience Robustness Ruggedness Survivability Brittleness Flexibility Reconfigureability Scalability Stability Controllability Elegance Symmetry Beauty Simplicity Reasonableness |
Transition Interoperability Usability Availability Fault tolerance Graceful degradation Performance Capacity Growth Technology insertion Ability to meet requirements Performance User acceptability Produce-ability Testability |
Reliability Maintainability Training Supportability Survivability Comfort Sustainability Effectiveness Safety Security Vulnerability Deployment Shutdown Disposal |
The following are Sustainability Tradeoff Criteria:
| Carbon Pollution Water Pollution Land Pollution Air Pollution Noise Pollution |
Visual Pollution Fuel Sustainability Regeneration Progress Model Results |
Internal Sustainability External Sustainability Survivability Population Growth Standard Of Living |
Social Mobility Freedom and Liberty Quality Of Life Happiness |
Sustainability Tradeoff Matrix
List the tradeoff criteria in rows and place the alternatives in columns. Rate each criterion for each alternative. The values can be 1-3, 1-4, 1-10, or a ranking of each alternative relative to the other alternatives. If using high, medium, or low, they can be translated to numbers. In the beginning of the trade study, fill in each cell of the matrix with a rating even if there is no supporting data. It is an educated guess based on current knowledge and perceptions. Play with each approach. Do this in one day.
Now comes the hard part of moving the content of the tradeoff matrix to fully vetted content approved by all the stakeholders. Examine the criterion and architecture alternatives. Examine each intersection or cell. Identify studies, techniques, methods and approaches to convert the initial gut-based ratings into ratings backed by sound scientific and engineering principles. This is performed as a group using hard science, soft science, and everything else in that order to back up the numbers. Document the logic even if it is just bullets on a chart.
Architecture Tradeoff Matrix
|
Take snapshots and change the cells of the tradeoff matrix. Add weights to the criteria based on continued refined analysis of the problem. Some criteria may disappear and others may surface. Don't be afraid to call the team in and have everyone enter their view of the rating for each cell, no matter how detached they may be from the detailed studies. At some point some criteria will become a wash and go away while others become very different or new criterion are added.
Sum the total for each approach. This is the rating for each architecture alternative. Keep it simple at first and do not use weights until there are some initial results. As more insight is gained apply a different weight to each criterion and change the total.
Develop initial costs and total life cycle costs (LCC) for each approach. Take each rating and divide it by the initial cost. That is the initial Architecture MOE. It is a measure of goodness of each approach for each dollar spent. Do the same thing for the life cycle cost and see if they are different. Pick the architecture that has the highest MOE when all costs are considered (the LCC). This yields the biggest advantage for each unit of cost.
Architecture MOE
The LCC is normalized. |
What should the tradeoff criteria include? That is really something the team decides. It is part of the discovery process. However, a word of caution: the tradeoff criteria should not include cost or requirements. It is a given that all solutions will satisfy the known requirements at some cost. Cost should be used at the bottom of the tradeoff where each approach's total rating is divided by cost. This essentially identifies the goodness of each approach per unit of cost: this is called the Architecture Measure of Effectiveness or Architecture MOE.
The tradeoff study is not about the numbers in the matrix. It is about the journey to populate the matrix. Anyone can go into a closed room, fill in a matrix, and emerge to dictate that this is the answer. That is a failed effort.
A team populates the tradeoff matrix where each architecture camp makes their position. As they find weakness in their architecture alternative, they then proceed to modify it until the weakness is mitigated or completely removed. As long as the architecture concept remains in place it matures and moves from a straw man approach that is easy to knock down to an iron man then stone man architecture that is difficult to knock down. This holds for all the architecture approaches considered in the tradeoff matrix. So, the tradeoff matrix is a framework to capture the quantitative study results and the qualitative arguments. It summarizes the arguments, positions, and journey that are captured in the architecture study.
MOE Carbon Based
[New to reflect carbon load tracking]
The MOE equation used LCC to determine the most effective architecture per total dollars spent. The MOE can use other criteria rather than money to deternine the most effective architecture including carbon load. The MOE equation is:
MOE = Sum of Tradeoff Criteria / Total Cost or LCC where LCC is:
LCC = R+D+P+O+M+S+I+E or PROMISED
R = Research
D = Development
P = Production
O = Operation
M = Maintenance
S = Shut Down & Disposal
I = Infrastructure (Indirect)
E = Environment & Waste
The MOE equation for the most effective carbon load architecture is:
MOE = Sum of Tradeoff Criteria / Total Cost or LCCL where LCCL is:
LCCL = M+P+D+O+M+W+S+T
M = Mining
P = Production
D = Distribution
O = Operation
M = Maintenance
W = Waste
S = Shut Down and Decommissioning
T = Disposal
Other Decision Making Approaches
[3] [4]
There are other decsion making approaches. They are as follows:
The Architecture Design Selection (ADS) decision making approach was partially described in this section. It uses:
Architecture Design Selection Big Picture
So architecture selection is a trade study. The most important aspect of the trade study is not the results but the journey. It is during the journey that the stakeholders learn things about the alternatives and ramifications of those alternatives that would normally never surface. Many people try to complicate the architecture tradeoff study because they attempt to document the journey without realizing they are documenting the journey. Once that simple realization sinks in then the documented journey is a pleasure to read and understand.
Author Comment: I would like to offer a personal example, which I believe, hits the nail right on the head relative to all value systems. I will never forget when my new wife and I went on our first trip to a challenged country in 1980. We stayed at a fabulous resort right out of a James Bond Movie. Eventually we took a pink jeep into town and I will never forget what I saw. As far as I could see there were people with picks and shovels digging a trench by the side of the road. The reality is if you just look at traditional financial numbers, you can never justify the cost of a bulldozer over the cost of these poor people digging with a pick and a shovel. This is the trap of third world thinking. Instead of buying a bulldozer and freeing these people to become bulldozer operators they were stuck in the mud and dirt. You need to punch through to another level of thinking.
Author Comment: When you investigate the MOE topic in other documents be aware that some confuse tradeoff criteria with MOE. The MOE is one thing and it is defined as the sum of all the tradeoff criteria numbers divided by the total life cycle cost. This is done for each architecture approach. In these documents they erroneously call the tradeoff criteria the MOE and then they mention it in the plural as MOEs. Then they never really say how you pick an approach. They sprinkle cost into the middle of the tradeoff items. I attribute this to the finance types running amok in the past 30 years.
Author Comment: There are also those that confuse the MOE with cost benefit analysis . The problem with cost benefit analysis is that financial metrics drive the answer rather than function and performance. So when they address a problem they usually get a very low quality solution or a non-working solution.
There should be typically 5 architecture designs tracked for a very long period of time. The LCC people should not be called until the system architecture designs are deeply understood from a functional and performance point of view. The architectures must survive the criteria ratings first. The analysts should not be tainted by early views of the costs until the architectures have been fully understood.
References
[1] Systems Practices for Sustainability, Walter Sobkiw, Published and used by INCOSE with permission, 2011.
[2] Sustainable development Possible with Creative Systems Engineering, Walter Sobkiw, 2008. ISBN 9780615216300.
[3] Systems Practices As Common Sense, Walter Sobkiw, ISBN: 978-0983253082, first edition 2011, ISBN: 978-0983253051, second edition 2020.
[4] Systems Engineering Design Renaissance, Walter Sobkiw, ISBN: 978-0983253075, 2014.
Climate Change A Systems Perspective
There are multiple approaches to dealing with climate change and they are:
The reality is that all the approaches will be used in the 21st century to deal with climate change. Approaches 2-3 fall into the category of science and engineering where there will be systems developed as a result of climate change and an attempt to deal with it effectively.
Some people will benefit from climate change, some may be unaffected in a positive or negative way, and some people will be negatively affected. For example, Russia may benefit from climate change with the melting of the polar ice caps. At the same time they will be negatively impacted with the melting of the Tundra permafrost that will cause infrastructure to fail. The entire planet will be negatively impacted with the melting of the permafrost because of massive methane release that some suggest will lead to runaway global warming. Essentially a positive feedback loop will be established where once a critical level of permafrost melts, the remaining permafrost will melt and it is unclear what the final climate will do to the civilization.
The U.S. Global Change Research Program, composed of 13 federal agencies, reported in 2009 that climate changes are being observed in every region of the world, including the United States and its coastal waters. Among these physical changes are increases in heavy downpours, rising temperature and sea level, rapidly retreating glaciers, thawing permafrost, lengthening growing seasons, lengthening ice free seasons in the oceans and on lakes and rivers, earlier snowmelt, and alterations in river flows. Assessments conducted by the U.S. intelligence community indicate that climate change could have significant geopolitical impacts around the world, contributing to poverty, environmental degradation, and the further weakening of fragile governments. Climate change will contribute to food and water scarcity, will increase the spread of disease, and will cause or exacerbate mass migration. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
The Arctic waters are opening and will permit more seasonal commerce and transit. This is an opportunity to work collaboratively to improve the human and environmental conditions in the region. The U.S. Department of Defense has stated that it will work with the Coast Guard and the Department of Homeland Security to address gaps in Arctic communications, domain awareness, search and rescue, and environmental observation and forecasting capabilities. [1] There are multiple nation states that stand to benefit from these changes. It is unclear if they will work with eachother or aggressively make claims that will lead to political instability.
The following is a list of some of the key negative impacts from Climate Change:
In 2014 Russia invaded Ukraine and annexed crimea. In the fog of war with massive propaganda and disinformation what was lost and is not in the mass mind is that Russia wanted to annex Crimea because of new finds of Gas and Oil reserves. Ukraine in partnership with U.S. companies was going to start development of the gas and oil fields the same year when Russia invaded. Since 2014 these fields have been developed by Russia and they earn money from these fields. So Russia expanded its existing energy export revenues. More importantly is that Ukraine did not become energy independent as planned from the new gas and oil reserves. It is obvious that this was a key Russian policy goal and it was achieved.
So what does this have to do with climate change? One would think that this is a bad investment in the future. The reality is that this approach to climate change is in the Do Nothing category - continue as always for the foreseeable future. This same policy was being followed by Ukraine and the rest of the world - continue to find new oil and gas reserves. 2014 War Background
In 2021 Russia invaded the rest of Ukraine. The question is why? Once again there is massive propaganda and disinformation. The reality is that Ukraine supports approximately 400 million people around the world with its food products. Russia as an empire may be reacting to their own internal research on climate change and how it will impact food in the 21st century. Ukrainian Food Production
All nation states have short term, mid term, and long term policies and plans. [1] [2]
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is a massive war. It also may be the first war that is associated with climate change.
Systems Engineering Solutions
Systems engineering is about understanding a problem from a needs and key requirements perspective, finding the most effective architectures that address the needs and key requirements, implementing those architectures using systems engineering practices, and operating, maintaining, decommissioning, and disposing of the these systems using systems practices. Within this concept is the Systems Engineering Solutions. What are the systems engineering solutions to climate change? A key observation is that the solution is not a single magic bullet solution. Instead is will be a large number of system solutions that all individually contribute to mitigate the negative effects of climate change.
A key element of systems engineering is to identify all the possible architectures that may be able to satisfy the needs and key requirements. The needs and key requirements are:
Slowing climate change and perhaps stopping climate change is associated with minimizing greenhouse gases and that is mostly driven by CO2 at this time. In the future it may be methane from permafrost melt. Reversing climate change is the removal of greenhouse gases. Minimizing the impact of climate change is acknowledging that climate change will continue and that there will be negative consequences.
Once the alternatives are identified and their function and performance are extensively studied to ensure the negative consequences are found, they need to be subjected to a tradeoff analysis that finds the most effective solution using the MOE equation. The traditional MOE is based on Life Cycle Costs. The Climate Change MOE is based on the Life Cycle Carbon Load equation:
LCCL = M+P+D+O+M+W+S+T Where:
M = Mining
P = Production
D = Distribution
O = Operation
M = Maintenance
W = Waste
S = Shut Down and Decommissioning
T = Disposal
MOE (climate change) = Sum of tradeoff criteria / LCCL
There is a masssive collection of data associated with CO2 production from various human activities. For example, the following table provides a list of power sources and CO2 per kWh.
CO2 per kWh
https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-carbon-footprint-of-1-kWh-of-electricity |
References
[1] U.S. Climate Change Technology Program STRATEGIC PLAN, U.S. Department of Energy (Lead-Agency), September 2006. https://downloads.globalchange.gov/cctp/CCTP-StratPlan-Sep-2006.pdf
[2] Presidential Memorandum -- Climate Change and National Security, September 21, 2016. PDF . https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/09/21/presidential-memorandum-climate-change-and-national-security
[3] Climate Migration and Equity, NRDC, May 9, 2022. https://www.nrdc.org/stories/climate-migration-equity
[4] Climate Change Is Already Driving Mass Migration Around the Globe, January 25, 2019. https://www.nrdc.org/stories/climate-change-already-driving-mass-migration-around-globe
[5] Climate Change Is Fueling Migration. Do Climate Migrants Have Legal Protections?, Council on Foreign Relations, December 19, 2022. https://www.cfr.org/in-brief/climate-change-fueling-migration-do-climate-migrants-have-legal-protections
[6] The slow onset effects of Climate Change and Human Rights Protection for cross-border migrants, Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in collaboration with the Platform on Disaster Displacement (PDD), 2018. https://www.ohchr.org/sites/default/files/Documents/Issues/Migration/OHCHR_slow_onset_of_Climate_Change_EN.pdf
The following is a list of possible architecture alternatives as system solutions.
High Impact of Failure Systems
When examining each of the above system architecture approaches, the Impact of Failure analysis needs to be performed [1]. As the name implies the impact of failure is identified and clearly stated. It is a high level view of what may eventually surface with a full Failure Mode Effects Analysis (FMEA) that is performed on a fully implemented system. In a tradeoff between different architecture solutions it is a tradeoff criteria. The following is an example:
| Architecture | Impact of Failure | Comments |
| Planetary Climate Engineering | Very High |
Unintended negative consequences will harm entire planet. |
| Nuclear Power | High |
Nuclear disaster will contaminate an entire region for a very long time. |
| Heat Load Removers | Low |
None. |
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Renewable Energy Purchase
Renewable Energy Purchase is an interesting architecture category because many are shifting to green power sources and claiming reduced carbon footprints. However, all they have done is just an accounting trick. The energy reductions of the buildings have not happened. This is an example of just shifting the burden to an unsuspecting stakeholder. To properly address the carbon load levels from buildings, the actual power load must be tracked and compared year over year, not the claimed carbon load where all of the sudden the carbon per watt rate changes because the power comes from a different billing source. Then the specific changes need to be identified with resulting actual carbon footprint reductions. For example:
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The following is an example of determining the LCCL for Retail Distribution Systems. Rather than use actual CO2 levels, a ranking scale is used in the initial analysis. The scale is 1-3 where 1 is the best level because it uses the least carbon.
LCCL |
Brick and Mortar |
Internet to Brick and Mortar |
Internet to Doorstep |
M = Mining |
0 |
0 |
0 |
P = Production |
0 |
0 |
0 |
D = Distribution |
1 |
2 |
3 |
O = Operation |
1 |
1 |
1 |
M = Maintenance |
1 |
1 |
1 |
W = Waste |
1 |
3 |
3 |
S = Shut Down and Decommissioning |
0 |
0 |
0 |
T = Disposal |
0 |
0 |
0 |
Total |
4 |
7 |
8 |
This analysis suggests that the new Internet to Doorstep system has the worst rating from a carbon footprint level. The Waste rating is based on the massive packaging that is used to ship individual items. We also see that the Internet to Brick and Mortar is not much better because of the massive packaging and inefficiencies in transport where more trips are needed to ship the products to the retail distribution points from the single distribution center. Just in time delivery to the retail shelf has a carbon cost.
Is this analysis complete - no. Does this analysis suggest that there may be a problem needing further system analysis - yes.
A further analysis can apply the number of trips needed to deliver a package to a doorstep. The following are some assumptions and findings:
1 trip Customer Visit to Retail Store Items (avg) = 10 items purchased
1 trip Internet to Doorstep Items (avg) = 2 items purchased
1 trip Product to Retail Store items (avg) = 500 items delivered
Trips per item Brick and Mortar = 1/10 + 1/500 = 0.102
Trips per item Internet to Doorstep = 1/2 = .5
Trips per item ratio Internet to Doorstep / Brick and Mortar = 5
From this second analysis we see that the Internet to Doorstep system takes 5 times more trips and thus 5 times more carbon than the Brick and Mortar system. One approach from the Internet to Doorstep system to mitigate the CO2 load is to purchase Carbon credits. However, all that does is just shift the costs to an unsuspecting stakeholder and adds more Carbon from the extra system to process the Carbon credits. The Internet to Doorstep system uses more carbon and only new technology or a change in the system can change the results. A new technology might be delivery vehicles that have 0 carbon levels.
Can there be an error in this analysis, yes. But it will take some serious digging to try to build a case against this analysis. This may not be a stoneman finding but it is not a strawman finding. It is an ironman finding needing multiple reviewers to topple the result. [1]
Strawman Architecture: Easily burned down by just one reviewer in a single sitting. [1]
Ironman Architecture: Not easily toppled, multiple reviewers over a significant amount of time needed to topple the architecture. [1]
Stoneman Architecture: Can not topple the architecture no matter how many reviewers or the amount of time. [1]
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All potential architectures should be subjected to the Strawman Architecture test. For example, the Solar Blankets to Slow Glacier Melt is a strawman architecture because of the following reasons:
Common sense burns down the architecture in 1 sitting by 1 person. No studies are needed until the above items are addressed. However, this did not stop the research. It became a monetized stream with various attempts and findings. Solar Blankets may protect selected regions of selected Glaciers for nostalgic and esthetic reasons but it will not impact the global CO2 levels. For example a 400 square meter blanket had 15% less mass loss than uncovered areas. [2] What happens when it starts to snow and freeze covering the blankets? The United States, glaciers currently cover over 90,000 square kilometers. This is an example of a product in search of a solution. Nostalgic and esthetic reasons at a resort is a reasonable need and this product may meet that need but it will not impact CO2 levels.
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A Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) is an arrangement with a third-party developer that installs, owns, and operates an energy system on a customer’s property. The customer then purchases the system's electric output for a predetermined period. A PPA allows the customer to receive stable and often low-cost electricity with no upfront cost, while also enabling the owner of the system to take advantage of tax credits and receive income from the sale of electricity. PPAs may last between 5 and 20 years, during that time the power purchaser buys energy at a pre-negotiated price.
On 1,600 acres in Fulton and Franklin counties in central Pennsylvania sit two solar arrays. There are more than 485,000 panels, that make up the largest solar project in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, with a capacity of 220 megawatts. Penn will purchase all electricity produced at the facility, the equivalent of 70% of the demand of its campus and University of Pennsylvania Health System facilities in the Philadelphia area. This comes from a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) the University signed in February of 2020. [3]
On April 22, 2024, 5 Pennsylvania Colleges, joined 3 From North Carolina in a joint solar energy Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) from a facility in Kentucky. Dickinson College, Haverford College, Lafayette College, Lehigh University, Muhlenberg College and Swarthmore College announced they have joined with three colleges in North Carolina as a part of a large-scale solar energy facility in western Kentucky. The joint initiative will allow the schools to access the benefits of renewable energy through a deal typically only feasible for large customers. The consortium is supporting the Sebree Solar II project through a PPA that involves purchasing energy for 20 years. The Sebree Solar II project is set to begin construction in early 2025 and commence commercial operation by the end of 2026. The solar site is projected to provide enough energy to annually power more than 24,000 homes when complete. The project will generate up to 150 MW of solar energy. Over its 30-year lifespan, the solar site will contribute approximately $12 million in additional tax revenue to Henderson County which can be used for roads, schools and other public services. While electricity generated by the Sebree Solar II project cannot be transmitted directly to the consortium campuses because of distance, the benefits of investing in new additional renewable energy will be transferred to the schools. Dickinson will be paying for an amount of energy equal to approximately 75% percent of the electricity used by its campus. Dickinson will receive renewable energy credits, which can be used to account for greenhouse gas emissions related to purchased electricity. [4]
The following table provides a list of power sources and CO2 per kWh. Approximately 40% of the power in the United States is coming from green sources. Solar is relatively small at this time.
U.S. Utility-Scale Electricity Generation and CO2 per kWh
https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-carbon-footprint-of-1-kWh-of-electricity |
It is unclear how much Green Power a specific University currently purchases. Assume it may be ~ 40%. Also the current grid power has some percentage of green power sources. So that kicks up the number some more. Everyday that number increases as the power grid gets more green power plants. Not sure what a specific University currently pays per kWh, but assume ~ $0.10. Will participating in a project like this translate to more, less, or the same cost per kWh? Also this really does not make a University lower its carbon footprint, it just shifts costs and carbon accounting. Reducing carbon footprint happens when engineering is involved where better / more efficient systems are installed like:
The following table shows some of the building systems power needs.
Building Systems |
Watts (1) (2) |
No |
With |
With |
With |
| Mechanical ventilation power 5 ACH (1000 sqft 12 ft ceiling) (3) | 517 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| Mechanical ventilation power 12 ACH (1000 sqft 12 ft ceiling) | 1242 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
UV Ventilation 12 eACH (1000 sqft) |
207 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| Cooling Systems (1000 sqft) (5) | 2,500 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| Water Chiller Systems | Various |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| Electric Heating Systems | Various |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
LED / Incandescent Lighting power 300 lux (1000 sqft) |
443 / 1948 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
LED / Incandescent Lighting power 500 lux (1000 sqft) |
738 / 3246 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
LED / Incandescent Lighting power 750 lux (1000 sqft) |
1107 / 4869 |
100% |
< 100% |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
| LED TV (~ 65 in) | 100 |
100% |
(6) |
NA |
NA |
| Laptops Computer | 30 - 70 |
100% |
(6) |
NA |
NA |
| Large desktop Computer | 200 - 500 |
100% |
(6) |
NA |
NA |
| Other Machinery | Various |
100% |
(6) |
5% - 20% |
10% - 50% |
(1) The numbers are approximate and will vary with specific design solutions
and with time (2023).
(2) The mechanical ventilation numbers are not linear because of duct
resistance.
(3) CDC guideline to aim for 5+ ACH.
(4) This is a function of how the occupants manage the building lights and
ventilation systems, do they / can they turn them off when they leave a
space.
(5) They cycle on and off while maintaining temperature, the issue is are
they running in unoccupied spaces.
(6) These systems have internal timers to turn off when there is no activity.
They need to be properly set.
(7) Estimates are 20% [6], other internet est. 5% - 15%
(8) Estimates are 50% [6], 19% - 29% [7], other internet est. 10% - 30%
See section Building Automation Systems for a description of these systems.
It is a good thing to put a new green power generating plant online, but to be clear this is a financial transaction and there are issues.
There are two approaches that currently exist to claim reduced carbon footprint - (1) Engineering and (2) Financial / Management solutions. Unfortunately the Financial / Management solution can be flawed. There are many examples of industry using carbon credits to ignore critical engineering projects that will actually reduce carbon footprint. For example in 2020 a French oil company docked a tanker loaded with Australian liquefied natural gas at the port of Dapeng in southern China. The company claimed that the LNG was carbon neutral because the emissions from burning it had been neutralized by carbon credits purchased from a wind farm in northern China. Another European oil company delivered a tanker load of LNG to a port in Taiwan. It was labeled carbon neutral, because of the company’s investment in forest projects in Ghana, Indonesia, and Peru. [6]
The labeling of Engineering vs Financial / Management as system solutions is important because there is the perception that the markets will solve any problem and that when a problem is detected, the approach should be one of market incentives to solve the problem. Many suggest that the issue with market based solutions is that they tend to be easily gamed and fail to provide the desired system outcomes. This has been an ongoing debate for decades; since the 1980's when massive government deregulation began in the US. The carbon offset Financial / Management as a system approach is just another example. [7] The alternative is an engineering solution, however unless a cost benefit analysis can justify a new system, the engineering solution investment must be forced using either government regulations, government tax incentives, or other external mechanisms including unique corporate charters and executive compensation plans that allow for such investments.
The final take away from this systems analysis is that a PPA may be a viable option for a University but NOT if it is used to delay or avoid the Engineering solutions to upgrade the infrastructure to provide for healthy and safe facilities and reduce carbon footprint. From a priority perspective, healthy and safe facilities that minimize carbon footprint should be the number one priority outweighing all other costs and investments in the University. Neglected and poor facilities are the start of severe decline in all organizations.
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References
[1] Systems Practices As Common Sense, Walter Sobkiw, ISBN: 978-0983253082, first edition 2011, ISBN: 978-0983253051, second edition 2020.
[2] Chinese scientists are combating a glacier's melting by covering it with a blanket, Phys.org by Science X Network, October 5, 2023. https://phys.org/news/2023-10-chinese-scientists-combating-glacier-blanket.html
[3] Penn celebrates operation and benefits of largest solar power project in Pennsylvania, Penn Today, University of Pennsylvania, March 18, 2024. https://penntoday.upenn.edu/news/penn-celebrates-operation-and-benefits-largest-solar-power-project-pennsylvania, 2024.
[4] 5 Pennsylvania Colleges, Join 3 From North Carolina In Joint Solar Energy Power Purchase Agreement From Facility In Kentucky, PA Environment Digest, 4/29/2024. http://www.paenvironmentdigest.com/newsletter/default.asp?NewsletterArticleID=60426, 2024.
[5] What is U.S. electricity generation by energy source, U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2023. https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3, 2024.
[6] Is the ‘Legacy’ Carbon Credit Market a Climate Plus or Just Hype?, Yale School of the Environment, March 9, 2021. https://e360.yale.edu/features/is-the-legacy-carbon-credit-market-a-climate-plus-or-just-hype, 2024.
[7] In-depth Q&A: Can ‘carbon offsets’ help to tackle climate change?, Carbon Brief, 24 September 2023. https://interactive.carbonbrief.org/carbon-offsets-2023/index.html, 2024.
The tradeoff analysis uses the LCCL to determine the MOE of each approach. The tradeoff criteria will change over time along with the tradeoff values for each of the criteria ratings because that is a qualitative assessment. The LCCL is a quantitative assessment. It may be difficult to find that actual LCCL values but they do exist. So the tradeoff starts with the LCCL assessments of some of the architecture alternatives.
The following is a list of suggested key tradeoff studies associated with Buildings and Energy:
Ventilation Tradeoff Analysis:
The tradeoff criteria ratings will be significantly different between
these alternatives, so the MOE will be driven by the criteria ratings rather
than the LCCL. Also the tradeoff criteria ratings will vary with geographic
location. The architectures are:
Mechanical Ventilation
Tradeoff Analysis: The tradeoff criteria ratings will be close for each
of the alternatives, so the MOE will be driven by the LCCL. The architectures
are:
Ventilation Control Tradeoff
Analysis: The tradeoff criteria ratings will be significantly different
between these alternatives because of human actions that will harm the system,
so the MOE will be driven by the criteria ratings rather than the LCCL. The
architectures are:
Buildings and Energy Tradeoff
Analysis: The MOE will be driven by the LCCL. This is an interesting
tradeoff because it suggests that decisions need to be made with allocating
an energy budget between different systems in a building. The architectures
are:
Tradeoff Calculations
For information on performing this analysis see section: Sustainable Development Systems Practices.
MOE = Total Criteria Rating / Total LCCL
where: LCCL = Life Cycle Carbon Load
The following table is the LCCL calculations for each architecture alternative.
LCCL |
Arch |
Arch |
Arch |
Arch |
Arch |
Arch |
M = Mining |
||||||
P = Production |
||||||
D = Distribution |
||||||
O = Operation |
||||||
M = Maintenance |
||||||
W = Waste |
||||||
S = Shut Down and Decommissioning |
||||||
T = Disposal |
||||||
Total LCCL |
The following table is the Tradeoff Criteria Matrix for each of the architecture alternatives.
Tradeoff Criteria |
Arch |
Arch |
Arch |
Arch |
Arch |
Arch |
1. Ability to meet requirements |
||||||
2. Ability to avoid human compromise (Vulnerability) |
||||||
Criteria 3 |
||||||
Criteria 4 |
||||||
Criteria 5 |
||||||
Criteria 6 |
||||||
Criteria 7 |
||||||
Criteria n |
||||||
Total Criteria Rating |
The following are key tradeoff criteria:
The following are potential General Tradeoff Criteria:
| Resilience * Robustness Ruggedness * Survivability * Brittleness Flexibility * Reconfigureability Scalability * Stability * Controllability * Elegance Symmetry Beauty Simplicity * Reasonableness * |
Transition * Interoperability * Usability * Availability Fault tolerance Graceful degradation * Performance * Capacity * Growth * Technology insertion * Ability to meet requirements * Performance * User acceptability * Produce-ability * Testability * |
Reliability * Maintainability * Training Supportability * Survivability * Comfort * Sustainability * Effectiveness Safety * Security * Vulnerability * Deployment * Shutdown * Disposal * |
The following are potential Sustainability Tradeoff Criteria:
| Carbon Pollution * Water Pollution * Land Pollution * Air Pollution * Noise Pollution * |
Visual Pollution * Fuel Sustainability Regeneration * Progress * Model Results |
Internal Sustainability * External Sustainability * Survivability Population Growth Standard Of Living * |
Social Mobility * Freedom and Liberty Quality Of Life * Happiness * |
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