Category: Blog

Over the past decade the move towards energy efficiency and sustainability has grown immensely. It used to be an issue only appreciated by green-lovers and flower-children, but today businesses, homeowners, and organizations across the country are consistently trying to improve and build upon these efforts.

Governments are another entity concerned with this and one county in Alabama is in the process of overhauling their systems. The Colbert County Commissioners learned the specifics of the plan earlier this week, according to Northwest Alabama news source TimesDaily.com.

Norman Schramm, a senior account executive with Siemens’ Energy and Environmental Solutions Division, gave the presentation. While the cost of the project initially could be steep, it is projected to save them money in the long run. In addition to replacing heating and cooling systems and ventilation air blowers they plan to replace the commercial roof exhaust fans they have with ones that can be more easily programmable and monitored.

Installing efficient fan motors that use “electronically commutated” (ECM) have been shown to help units save money. Also, doing something as little as backing off on central cooling by 3 degrees Fahrenheit can reduce air conditioning costs by up to 15%. Having efficient fans is a great way to keep people cool in the meantime.

Another way to make industrial exhaust fans more energy efficient is through the use of demand ventilation controls. Typically, these can reduce the cost to operate an exhaust system between 30 and 50% and can be installed on new installations or retrofitted onto existing hoods.

Another area the county plans to spend a lot of money on is in their bathrooms. In total, 270 urinals, toilets, sinks, and other fixtures will be completely replaced. In order for them to calculate the size of exhaust fan they’ll need for these rooms they’ll have to take the volume of the bathroom and divide by five.

Other counties, cities, and municipalities across the country should take a lesson from this aggressive Alabama plan and start thinking about ways to update their own facilities.

The importance of ensuring your home is equipped with smoke and, in this case, carbon monoxide (CO) detectors was highlighted in a recent case potentially involving a fault exhaust fan. A middle-aged Waukegan couple, whose identity has remained anonymous, were airlifted to an undisclosed hospital on Wednesday morning for CO poisoning, according to the Chicago Tribune.

A spokesman for the Waukegan Fire Department, Michael Scholle, said that an ambulance was called to the home at about 7 a.m. after one of the residents called 911 to report dizziness and other health problems. When paramedics arrived on the scene they found carbon monoxide levels inside the home of 150 parts per million. The home did not have a carbon monoxide detector.

“That high a reading would be very dangerous,” said Scholle. “They were very, very lucky.”

While the incident remains under investigation for now, Fire Chief George Bridges believes a faulty exhaust fan could have been the source of the problem. It’s unclear exactly what type or where it was, but it could have been in a bathroom with a high ceiling (over eight feet), which generally require additional ventilation.

“We continue to stress the need for smoke detectors and carbon monoxide detectors to be installed in all homes,” Bridges said in a statement.

Unlike commercial centrifugal fans or industrial fans, which are normally roof mounted with the inlet and outlet 90 degrees from each other, residential exhaust fans are much smaller. To calculate the minimum size a bathroom will require you take the volume of the room and divide by five.

The last CO-related death in Waukegan occurred in March of 2012, but just this past June in Nearby Highland Park a couple died from CO poisoning after their keyless car was left running in the garage, according to Lake County authorities. Local fire departments across the country will provide free smoke and CO detectors upon request.

While many of us do not realize it, indoor air is full of pollutants, odors, and allergens that negatively effect our health and the structural integrity of our spaces. Ventilation helps to remove the air of these unwanted pollutants. For commercial spaces, ventilation is especially important.

Here are three commercial spaces that rely on ventilation:

Restaurants
Restaurant kitchens have a high volume of customers, and with that, they have a great deal of activity in their commercial kitchens. Because of this, a great deal of grease, foul odor, and moisture tends to build up in commercial kitchens. To combat this, ventilation is used. Commercial exhaust fans effectively filter the air of unwanted impurities, such as smoke and grease, and improve the overall air quality of the kitchen and the restaurant. Restaurant exhaust systems have to be cleaned once every three months, and sometimes more frequently.

In addition to keeping the air quality sufficient for patrons and the kitchen, restaurants have to make sure that their produce and other food is stored safely and kept cool. In order to do so, restaurants use walk in freezers. When installed with efficient motors, restaurant owners can save $200 per fan every year.

Hospitals
In spaces like hospitals, proper ventilation is extremely important. When people are sick, air environment quality is essential. Along with controlling humidity and odors, commercial centrifugal fans help to circulate the air and rid it of harmful pollutants and allergies. Many hospitals use laminar fans, because of their high air circulation rate of 300 times in one hour.

Warehouses
Many large businesses use warehouses to store products and oversee production. Because these spaces house all of their merchandise, it’s important to have proper ventilation. Otherwise, the business is at risk of property damage and money loss. For ventilation, industrial exhaust fans are used. Industrial exhaust fans keep warehouse spaces dry, cool and fumigated, keeping the environment ideal for product storage.

Excess moisture can build up in bathrooms fairly easily. With the heat and steam produced from baths and showers, humidity often reaches high levels. When that happens, your bathroom is at risk of developing mold, mold spores, and other bacteria that ultimately pose health risks for you and your family. Additionally, humidity can cause structural damage, such as peeling paint, rust, and warped doors.

Ventilation is essential in managing and combating excess humidity and moisture in bathrooms. Not only will it protect the integrity of your bathroom, preventing future costs and repairs, but it will also protect the health of yourself and your family.

Bathroom Exhaust Fans
Exhaust fans are air blowers that mechanically ventilate bathrooms, eliminating humidity and the presence of excess moisture. In addition to moisture, bathroom exhaust fans help to remove pollutants and allergens from the air, effectively improving the overall air quality of the room.

As another option, many bathrooms have centrifugal inline duct fans, that ventilate air through a duct sealed by a wall vent.

Finding the Right Bathroom Exhaust Fan
Exhaust fans come in many sizes. To find an appropriately sized duct fans for your bathroom, measure the volume of the room and then divide it by five. In addition to exhaust fans, bathrooms with higher ceilings may need additional ventilation. This is when an inline duct fan may be appropriate.

If you are easily irked by loud noises, be sure to check out your bathroom exhaust fan’s sone rating before purchase. A sone rating rates the level of sound ventilation systems and fans make. With sone ratings, a 4 is highest, and is considered extremely loud.

Things to Consider
If your bathroom is in its own enclosed space, then a separate exhaust fan should be installed within it. And whenever possible, place exhaust fan vents as close to the shower area as you can.

Air quality is something that we generally take for granted. But did you know that indoor air often contains a range of pollutants, allergens, moisture, and dust? To combat these airborne pollutants, exhaust fans are often used as means of ventilation. Here are five common uses for exhaust fans:

Kitchens
Many of us spend a majority of our time in the kitchen, but it’s also a place where we get creative. And every culinary creation runs the risk of odors, smoke, and grease. Whether for home or commercial uses, a kitchen exhaust fan helps remove odors, smoke, grease, and moisture from your kitchen.

Bathrooms
A lot of moisture builds up in bathrooms, due to showers, baths, and the resulting condensation. When this moisture accumulates on tiles and mirrors, the excess condensation can lead to the growth of mold spores. Bathroom exhaust fans are relatively expensive and easily eliminate this issue. If you’re looking to find an appropriately sized bathroom exhaust fan, simply measure the room’s volume and divide that number by five. Additionally, if your bathroom’s ceiling is exceptionally high (over eight feet), more than one vent may be required.

Chimney Fans
Having a chimney and fireplace is a luxury, particularly during the winter. However, chimneys always run the risk of poor drafting and ventilation, in result allowing smoke and odors to disperse in your home. In order to combat this, chimney fans are often used for ventilation. Chimney exhaust fans effectively drive smoke up the chimney flue and out of your home, in result creating a proper draft and a smoke-free home.

Industrial
In order to keep products cool and dry and to keep production standards high, commercial exhaust fans are extremely efficient and useful for commercial spaces and warehouses. Additionally, industrial exhaust fans de-fumigate, preventing any stale, or noxious air from remaining.

Hospitals
Believe it or not, the air inside of buildings can often be filled with more pollutants, allergens, and unwanted moisture than outside air. For buildings such as hospitals, air quality is extremely important for keeping patients at optimal health in an environment conducive to healing. Exhaust fans ensure that patients can undergo procedures and recovery in a clean, allergen and pollutant free environment. Laminar fans are particularly popular in hospitals, as they circulate air as fast as 300 times in one hour.

Although there are a number of different types of fans they fall into one of two basic categories; axial or centrifugal; which are also referred to as radial fans. In most cases people are very aware of radial fans as this is what they have in their home, they can be desk or stand fans as well as wall mounted exhaust fans; even the fan on your car is a radial design as is the cooling fan for your computer.

Axial fans blow air in the same direction as the fan shaft whereas a centrifugal air blower draws air in and discharges it perpendicular to the fan shaft. Although both designs move air they have very different characteristics and uses. The axial fan has a series of blades similar to a propeller; these types of fans can move huge volumes of air but at relatively low pressure. Centrifugal fans on the other hand have curved blades and are used because the design allows the fan to develop high pressure which makes it ideal for certain air pollution control systems and other industrial applications.

A centrifugal air blower is made up of a fan wheel, housing and a drive mechanism and at times dampers for both the inlet and outlet. The fan wheel is the key to the function, the wheel is made from a series of blades which are mounted to a central hub; this wheel assembly rides on a fan shaft which passes through the housing. With an axial fan the air enters the fan from the back and exits straight through at the front air for a centrifugal fan enters the housing from the side and is discharged from the housing at 90 degrees to the direction of entry.

The wheel must be driven by a motor; the type of drive can be direct, with belts or variable speed. The type of drive design is that which determines the speed that the fan wheel rotates. In the case of a direct drive the wheel will mimic the speed of the motor and is fixed. When the speed of the fan wheel wants to be slower than that of the motor it is usually done with two pulleys of different diameters and drive belts. The difference in pulley sizes determines the ratio of input RPMs to output speed.

Because a centrifugal air blower can produce high air pressures it is used in such diverse applications as grain driers to greenhouse ventilation to HVAC applications.

Kitchen exhaust fans are recommended for all kitchens, whether they are in residential homes or commercial enterprises. There are a number of different kitchen exhaust fans to choose from; they include the simple exhaust fan which is mounted in a wall or ceiling, range hoods and commercial exhaust systems.

Kitchen ventilation is a necessity as it is important to vent humidity from steam and cooking odors as well as air borne grease. Although in a domestic environment the greatest amount of humidity comes from boiling water on the stove top, it also comes from washing dishes with hot water. In those homes and commercial establishments where gas is the fuel of choice, it is also important that carbon monoxide fumes are also eliminated. There is also the issue with odors that must be eliminated and the most efficient way to do this is to pull them out with some sort of exhaust fan.

In many kitchens the owner will install either a ceiling mount exhaust fan or a wall mounted unit. In the case of a ceiling mount fan it is important that it be ducted outside whereas a wall mounted unit can fit neatly into a preformed cavity in the wall. There are many different sizes of these fans available, small units are preferred for the home while commercial kitchens will have significantly larger units.

A range hood is another type of kitchen exhaust fan. In this case a hood which has an integral exhaust fan is mounted above the cooking surface. When the fan is engaged the steam, grease and odors are pulled into the hood and then vented outdoors through a duct. This is the ideal way but there are also range hoods that are not vented, they filter the air which is then returned to the kitchen. This type of range hood is often preferred when the cooking surface is located against an interior wall and ducting is difficult.

Industrial kitchens such as those found in canteens, restaurants, hospitals, etc have all the same problems; just bigger. There is a huge amount of heat and steam generated in an industrial kitchen as well as a large amount of grease. In these cases the solution lies with a combination of devices. Normally there is a full length hood that spans all the cooking appliances, through one or more outlets the moisture, odors and grease are pulled out with the use of large industrial duty roof mounted centrifugal fans which are equipped with grease filters and dampers.

Regardless of the size of the kitchen, the fuel that is used or the location of the appliances there is a way to exhaust the hot, damp and odorous air.

The air we breathe can contain unwanted contaminates such as smoke, odors, moisture, dust and other particulates; ventilation exhaust fans are used to control the environment in which we live by removing these contaminates and venting them outdoors. Although exhaust fans are often stand alone devices they can also be integrated into heating and cooling systems. In a home the most common location for exhaust fans is the bathroom, kitchen and perhaps the laundry area and these fans are either included with a new home or reasonably easy to install in an existing home.

The classic installation area for ventilation exhaust fans are in kitchens and bathrooms. These areas, along with the laundry room have the tendency of getting very steamed up and odorous. Steam is something that promotes the rapid development of mold and mildew in a house as it can form on any damp surface. The exhaust fan can be run during bathing, cooking and doing the laundry to vent the air in the area to the outside, once there it simply disperses. The kitchen exhaust fan not only eliminates the steam from cooking, it rids the kitchen of cooking odors as well as smoke should the stove be equipped with an indoor grill.

Although the exhaust fans are primarily used to eliminate humidity and odors, they can also be used for climate control. During the warm summer months the fan can be used to push the warm air out, this creates a slight negative internal pressure which draws cooler air in from outside. Of course a lot has to do with the temperature of the day but in many cases ventilation exhaust fans can be used instead of costly air conditioning.

People have a tendency to think about their home when it comes to air quality but the situation is just as bad if not worse in factories, garages and other workshop spaces. In the home the issue is oriented to eliminate moisture and cooking odors, in a factory environment it is more than that. Factory areas can often have vapors which are potentially harmful to the employees. In cases like this industrial duty ventilation exhaust fans are used as part of a total pollution control system.

Any space can be vented with an exhaust fan; they are found in restaurants, storage warehouses as well as commercial spaces such as delicatessens, meat and fish markets and even hospital operating rooms.