Have you ever worked in one of those big office buildings with air conditioning so arctic that people have to wear sweaters and jackets to work in the summer, or bring personal heaters for their cubicles? It’s a common problem, and an extremely wasteful one. I’m reminded of Wal-Mart, where the heating and cooling for each store are controlled not just from one location inside the store, but completely off-site, from Wal-Mart headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas. Now, a new study reported by New Scientist has found that if every worker had their own vent and temperature controls at their desk, a building’s energy costs could be cut in half.
Personalised ventilation means less air needs to be cooled and pumped through a building because air needs only to be blown at desks, and not throughout entire rooms. Individual vents can also switch off automatically when a desk is vacant. The result is that a room’s temperature can increase while keeping people comfortable at work.
In a quest for further energy cost savings, the Japanese government has been encouraging businesses to relax mandates for employees to wear suits and ties to work; more casual attire, the thinking goes would keep people cooler more easily.
Past research has shown personal ventilation can also make people more comfortable, and hinted it can limit the spread of airborne diseases. The personalised approach isn’t always suitable, though. Only workplaces where people tend to stay in one place would benefit, points out environmental engineer Peter Nielsen of Aalborg University in Denmark. Savings are also smaller in cooler climates, where on cold days the number of people directing warm air onto themselves causes the room to overheat.
What do you think — would you rather have a vent at your desk, or keep things the way they are?
Photo by the Red Cross.
Comments (18)
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Yes, I would like to have a vent at my desk. Despite the fact that I work from home, my office is on the enclosed back porch, with no enclosed foundation below and no central heat vent. It gets pretty cold back here!
Now if Santa would just bring me a space heater that worked…
posted by Miss Cellania on 12-22-2009 at 1:32 pm
Definitely a vent at my desk! I work with alot of men who are usually warm so the office is always set to somewhere in the 60′s. I have a heater on my desk blowing hot air on me most days…the ventilation system would be much appreciated!
posted by KayTee on 12-22-2009 at 2:40 pm
Definitely my own vent. That would be awesome. For some reason, it is colder at my end of the aisle. I am sure I suck up more energy with my little space heater.
posted by Hyacinth on 12-22-2009 at 3:02 pm
I’d be willing to do almost anything for my own vent. I work in a room with a bunch of guys who are always too hot so I sit here in my sweater and freeze. Would wearing my winter coat at my desk be too much? (Space heater is not an option for me unfortunately…)
how appropriate, recaptcha “all January”
posted by Heather on 12-22-2009 at 3:12 pm
Definitely a vent at the desk! For some reason our office suite has really bad climate controls. So even if the “heater” is on, about 1/2 of us have out own space heaters going at the same time. The other 1/2 are too warm and put on fans. This would be beneficial.
posted by Gina on 12-22-2009 at 3:32 pm
I work at a University, and my office has about 40-50 people. ALL of the people in my office have a small space heater. Students and staff wear jackets all year round because it is always so cold (I live in southeast Texas). So, yeah, vent all the way.
posted by Pink Coat on 12-22-2009 at 4:05 pm
Definitely need a vent. There are 40 people in here and we are all cold, all year. I keep a blanket at my desk and most of the other people have sweaters. I should not be needing a blanket in July in Missouri.
posted by Jenn on 12-22-2009 at 4:30 pm
the tiny space heater under my desk and i are all for individual climate control.
posted by m on 12-22-2009 at 5:17 pm
I wish it would be that simple.
The kind of technology this article is talking about would really only be practical in very small offices (less than 10 people). This is also assuming that each person in this office would be in the same boat, that is, they all were wanting cool air or hot air.
Variable Refrigerant Volume units are the closest systems available to a “personal” climate control system. These systems are complex and costly, and still heat and cool large areas, instead of individual spaces.
Most of the time there are many reasons people are uncomfortable in an office setting. Here are two.
1) Commercial Office buildings are designed to counter-act the heat load inside the building (people, computers, appliances, etc.). Lets say a building was designed for 100 people and 100 computers. If half the people leave, then the air conditioning system will be too large to keep the building at the proper temperature, and the building will stay cold.
2) Placing computers and other heat generating items near a thermostat will cause the thermostat to artificially report a higher temperature, (say 80 degrees, instead of the ambient 72) this will tell the air conditioning to try to cool the area down, even though the area is at the correct temperature.
posted by Pete on 12-22-2009 at 5:47 pm
Thanks for taking all the fun out of our fantasy, Pete! (jk!)
posted by Hyacinth on 12-22-2009 at 7:41 pm
I work in a school where the ventilation is completely crazy. The gym is an oven while my classroom is an icebox. Therefore, I too use the small space heater under my desk for personal climate control.
posted by KerriD on 12-22-2009 at 7:51 pm
What about us folks who are always hot? I work in a hospital emergency department and it’s ALWAYS too warm. I have a personal fan but it’s no good if it just blows hot air. Why can’t someone make a personal cooling device?
posted by althea on 12-23-2009 at 1:46 am
I used to work at a school where they divided a room into three offices. I got the vent, the person next to me got the thermostat, and the last one got the return. I managed to close the vent after about three years of keeping the window open all year.
posted by Dave on 12-23-2009 at 2:19 am
Personally, I think it is ridiculous to bring in personal heaters, coolers or other climate control devices. You see, we (human beings) are warm blooded beings and as such, we are able to adapt to our surroundings pretty well. How do you think people survived for thousands of years without indoor heating and/or air conditioning. I doubt that any office/work place ever lets the temperature drop under 70 degrees. Even if the temp fluxuates 5 degrees in either direction, a person can function just fine because of our awesome ability to adapt. And if you sit near a window, vent, or in an area where you are affected adversely by the temperature, you should wear more/less clothes. Guess what? You will live.
posted by Ian from Baltimore on 12-23-2009 at 8:37 am
It’s not a matter of surviving or dying. Sure I will not die from being too cold at work, but it’s a question of being comfortable in the XXI century. It’s especially frustrating in the summer. It seems that the hotter it gets outside the colder it gets inside. It is nice to be able to wear summer clothes to work in the summer and not be freezing. Like skirts, and sandals and short sleeves (whatever your office permits).
Someone who wears long pants and socks and shoes and a shirt is going to be warmer.
You don’t always want to have to bundle up with blankets and sweaters, especially in the summer.
posted by L. on 12-23-2009 at 11:45 am
I manage the heating/cooling for a 48,000 square ft building and its something I wouldn’t wish on anyone. There’s a +/- 5 degree tolerance between men and women and that’s a huge number. There are areas in the bulding where I couldn’t work because it’s so warm, and yet I still get complaints that it’s too cold.
But here’s the thing and the source of most complaints: There’s an OSHA requirement for outside air circulation that’s based on building size, HVAC unit size and number of people in the building. You can make all the temperature adjustments you want, but when things are equalized, there’ll still be outside air circulating in – to0 hot in the summer and too cold in the winter. . . .
posted by gwdmaine on 12-23-2009 at 12:31 pm
Personal ventilation!!!
I have a personal heater at my desk and it only warms half of my body at a time… :(
And people tend to gather around my desk, seeing as I have the only heater probably on the second floor…
posted by Chrystani on 12-23-2009 at 1:13 pm
@Ian from Baltimore, yes, we will live, but being so uncomfortable in either heat or cold lowers productivity! When my fingers are cold and numb, I cannot type. In my last office, I was near a patch panel room which needed to have cold air pumped in…. as an added bonus, it also blew directly onto my desk. Closing the door was not an option. I had a personal heater and a pair of lightweight gloves, both of which I used all year-round. In my present office, it still gets cold, but a sweater and a hot cup of coffee usually suffice.
posted by Mama9cats on 12-29-2009 at 2:44 pm