News You Need To Know: ASHRAE’s New Indoor Air Quality Standards

We at the Goodway Just Venting blog want to keep you “in the know” about all the developments in the industry, especially when there are new regulations that could affect your facility’s operations.

In late October, the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE), announced its newly published 2013 version of indoor air quality standards. As most in the industry know, ASHRAE, founded in 1894, is recognized as an international society dedicated to indoor environment control technology in the HVAC industry.

The new standard, “ANSI/ASHRAE Standard 62.1-2013 – Ventilation for Acceptable Indoor Air Quality” sets guidelines for ventilation rates and other requirements for commercial facilities.

Standard 62.1-2013 combines the 2010 standard with addenda to provide a consolidated version. The changes are intended to improve the standard by removing inconsistencies and offering more clarification to help facilities provide adequate airflow for their occupants while also reducing energy consumption.

ASHRAE says the most significant changes are these:

• Table 6-2, Zone Air Distribution Effectiveness is modified to increase the ventilation effectiveness of underfloor air distribution systems that meet certain conditions.
• Requirements for the quality of water used in humidification systems are modified and clarified.
• Building level pressurization requirements are clarified, including adding a definition of “exfiltration.”
• A performance alternative to the prescriptive exhaust rates is added. This approach differs from the Indoor Air Quality Procedure, the existing performance-based method for setting supply ventilation rates, in that monitoring of the concentrations of contaminants of concern is required and provides the basis for control of exhaust flow rates.
• There are some changes to the ventilation rates and space types in Table 6-1. These add refrigerated warehouses and change the ventilation rate for sports-related spaces to include a per-occupant component that allows the use of demand controlled ventilation in these spaces.
• The filtration requirement on air entering wetted cooling coils has been modified to change the MERV rating from 6 to 8. This change will reduce the potential for particulate deposition on the coils that could lead to biological or other contamination on the coils.
• Toilet exhaust air that is cleaned to Class 1 may be recirculated.

You can purchase the full document ANSI/ASHRAE Standard 62.1-2013 – Ventilation for Acceptable Indoor Air Quality from the ASHRAE Bookstore.

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