About the glossary

Disclaimer

This Glossary is the result of the efforts of Indoor Environmental Quality Global Alliance (IEQGA) volunteers. It has been written with care, using the best available information and the soundest judgement possible. IEQ-GA and its volunteers, who contributed to this Glossary, make no representation or warranty, expressed or implied, concerning the completeness, accuracy or applicability of the information contained in the Glossary. No liability of any kind shall be assumed by IEQ-GA or the authors of this Glossary as a result of reliance on any information contained in this document. The user shall assume the entire risk of using any information contained in this Glossary.

This Glossary is by nature under continuous development and anyone who likes to contribute to its development can send his proposal to the IEA-GA secretariat at the email reported below. If accepted, such proposal will be included in the next Glossary update. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Copyright © 2024 by IEQ-GA

IEQ-GA is the Indoor Environmental Quality Global Alliance, https://ieq-ga.net.

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopies or any other information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Requests for permission to make copies of any part of the work should be addressed to: IEQ-GA at REHVA Office, 40 Rue Washington, 1050 Brussels – Belgium e-mail: nw@rehva.eu

 

Preface

Since the beginning of the outbreak, IEQ-GA and its member organizations, as well as the many researchers, doctors, practitioners, and contractors who are members of these member organizations, have been working diligently on all aspects of the pandemic. At that time, IEQ-GA has assembled a COVID-19 Task Force to discuss the indoor environmental quality issues involved with the pandemic and their aftermath, to provide pertinent information on COVID-19 related issues and a series of Questions & Answers (Q&A) that were intended to help anyone who had concerns about COVID-19.

After the outbreak was ended, the Task Force members asked themselves whether they could still be useful to the world community through their specific expertise, and the idea of producing a comparative glossary in the field of ventilation, infiltration and air condition was coming out. That main reason was that there are in this field a lot of internationally recognised technical standards using different definitions for the same terms. A comparative glossary that put together the available definitions of the same term with their references can help to understand the correct meaning in the specific contest avoiding misunderstanding.

This Glossary is thus a project of the IEQ-GA Covid-19 Task Force and the work has been coordinated by IEQ-GA’s Italian member AICARR.

The IEQ-GA Board would like to express its sincere gratitude to AICARR and the Covid-19 Task Force for their invaluable work.

Donald Weekes
President of IEQ-GA

 

Foreword

The Environmental Quality – Global Alliance (IEQ-GA) has been incorporated in 2019 as an international non- profit organization under Belgian law by the founding members ACGIH, AICARR, ASHRAE, AIVC, AIHA, REHVA, ISHRAE.

The alliance is formed as an interdisciplinary, international working group of member organizations interested in indoor air quality, thermal comfort, lighting, acoustic science, technology, and applications. IEQ-GA intends to stimulate activities such as conferences and publications that will help in a significant way to improve the actual, delivered indoor environmental quality in buildings.

The vision of the Indoor Environmental Quality – Global Alliance (IEQ-GA) is to be the world’s primary source for information, guidelines and knowledge on the indoor environmental quality in buildings and places of work around the world.

The mission of IEQ-GA is to provide an acceptable indoor environmental quality (thermal environment-indoor air quality-lighting-acoustic) to occupants in buildings and places of work around the world and to make sure the knowledge from research on IEQ get to be implemented in practice.

The objective of the alliance is to get the societies to think together, work together and speak with the same voice. The alliance is formed as an interdisciplinary, international working group of societies interested in indoor air quality, thermal comfort, lighting and acoustic science, technology, and applications to stimulate activities that will help in a significant way to improve the actual, delivered indoor environmental quality in buildings

There exist several national and international societies dealing fully or partly with the indoor environment; but their voice is often neglected. As the indoor environmental quality is a multidisciplinary issue involving architects, engineers, health specialist, occupational health specialist etc. there is not one society, which in a significant way can make sure that all parties in the chain for providing the indoor environmental quality will do the work.

 

Introduction

The Indoor Environmental Quality – Global Alliance is pleased to present a Glossary of air infiltration, ventilation, and air conditioning terms. The Glossary was developed by the member organizations’ representatives led by Professor Livio Mazzarella, Politecnico di Milano – Dipartimento di Energia. It fulfills a goal of IEQ-GA to generate documents that will be useful to all its members, as well as others that have an interest in the terms that are acceptable in these fields (air infiltration, ventilation, and air conditioning.

The Glossary is posted on IEQ-GA’s website (https://ieq-ga.net/), and it is available to all to download as a free document. It is expected that the Glossary will be utilized by all individuals who have an interest in air infiltration, ventilation, and air conditioning as a tool to be implemented for all documents, standards, manuscripts, and research papers.

The Glossary contains hundreds of definitions of words relating to air infiltration, ventilation, and air conditioning. It is set up in an alphabetical format for use of use. It is noted that the definitions were taken a wide variety of standards and glossaries issued by reputable professional organizations and standards, including ASHRAE; AIVC; REHVA; ISO; European Standards; and other sources.

IEQ-GA member organizations currently number eleven full members and two affiliate members from all over the world. The mission of IEQ-GA is to provide an acceptable indoor environmental quality (thermal environment; indoor air quality; lighting; acoustic) to occupants in buildings and places of work around the world and to make sure the knowledge from research on IEQ get to be implemented in practice. We welcome all professional associations throughout the world with an interest in indoor environmental quality (IEQ) to join us in this mission. https://ieq-ga.net/contact/how-to-join-us

Specifically, the glossary contained definitions of words relating to air infiltration, ventilation and air conditioning taken from the following standards and glossaries:

  • Air Infiltration and Ventilation Glossary, Air Infiltration and Ventilation Centre, 1992 referred as: [AIVC, Air infiltration and ventilation glossary, 1992]
  • ASHRAE Standard 62.1-2022, Ventilation and Acceptable Indoor Air Quality, referred to as [ASHRAE Standard 62.1]
  • ANSI/ASHRAE Standard 62.2-2022 Ventilation and Acceptable Indoor Air Quality in Residential Buildings, ASHRAE, referred to as: [ASHRAE Standard 62.2]
  • ASHRAE- Standard 241-2023 Control of Infectious Aerosols, ASHRAE, referred to as: [ASHRAE Standard 241]
  • Building Performance Association,
  • EN 12792-2003 – Ventilation for buildings – Symbols, terminology and graphical symbols, CEN, 2003, referred to as [EN 12792-2003]
  • EN 13141-4:2021 – Ventilation for buildings – Performance testing of components/products for residential ventilation – Part 7: Aerodynamic, electrical power IEQ-GA Indoor Environmental Quality Global Alliance – AIVAC Glossary and acoustic performance of unidirectional ventilation units, CEN, 2021, referred to as [EN 13141-4:2021]
  • EN 13141-7:2021 – Ventilation for buildings – Performance testing of components/products for residential ventilation – Part 7: Performance testing of ducted mechanical supply and exhaust ventilation units (including heat recovery), CEN, 2021, referred to as [EN 13141-7:2021]
  • EN 14511-1:2022 – Air conditioners, liquid chilling packages and heat pumps for space heating and cooling and process chillers, with electrically driven compressors – Part 1: Terms and definitions, CEN, 2022, referred to as [EN 14511-1:2022]
  • EN 15665:2009 – Ventilation for buildings – Determining performance criteria for residential ventilation systems, CEN 2009, referred to as: [EN 15665:2009]
  • EN 16798-1:2019 – Energy performance of buildings – Ventilation for buildings – Part 1: Indoor environmental input parameters for design and assessment of energy performance of buildings addressing indoor air quality, thermal environment, lighting and acoustics – Module M1-6, CEN, 2019, referred to as [EN 16798-1:2019]
  • EN 16798-3:2017 – Energy performance of buildings – Ventilation for buildings – Part 3: For non-residential buildings – Performance requirements for ventilation and roomconditioning systems (Modules M5-1, M5-4), CEN, 2027, referred to as: [EN 16798-3:2017]
  • EN 16798-5-1:2017 – Energy performance of buildings – Ventilation for buildings – Part 5-1: Calculation methods for energy requirements of ventilation and air conditioning systems (Modules M5-6, M5-8, M6-5, M6-8, M7-5, M7-8) – Method 1: Distribution and generation, CEN, 2017, referred to as [EN 16798-5-1:2017]
  • EN 16798-5-2:2017 – Energy performance of buildings – Ventilation for buildings – Part 5-2: Calculation methods for energy requirements of ventilation systems (Modules M5- 6, M5-8, M6-5, M6-8, M7-5, M7-8) – Method 2: Distribution and generation, CEN 2017, referred to as [EN 16798-5-2:2017]
  • EN 16798-7:2017 – Energy performance of buildings – Ventilation for buildings – Part 7: Calculation methods for the determination of air flow rates in buildings including infiltration (Modules M5- 5) CEN 2017, referred to as [EN 16798-7:2017]
  • EN ISO 16484-1:2024 – Building automation and control systems (BACS) — Part 1: Project specification and implementation, CEN/ISO 2024, referred to as [EN ISO 16484-1:2024]
  • EN ISO 26800:2011 – Ergonomics — General approach, principles and concepts, CEN/ISO 2011, referred to as [EN ISO 26800:2011]
  • EN ISO 41011:2024- Facility management — Vocabulary, CEN/ISO 2011, referred to as [EN ISO 41011:2024] IEQ-GA Indoor Environmental Quality Global Alliance – AIVAC Glossary
  • EPA – United States Environmental Protection Agency, IAQ Building Education and Assessment Model (I-BEAM) – Glossary of Terms, referred to as: [EPA, IAQ Glossary]
  • EPA – United States Environmental Protection Agency, Glossary of Terms & Acronyms, referred to as: [EPA, Terms & Acronyms Glossary]
  • IFMA – The International Facility Management Association, Glossary, Glossary search – IFMA Knowledge Library, referred to as [IFMA, Glossary]
  • ISO 7482-1:1998 – Raw goat skins — Part 1: Descriptions of defects, ISO 1998, referred to as: [ISO 7482-1:1998]
  • ISO 16814:2008 – Building environment design — Indoor air quality — Methods of expressing the quality of indoor air for human occupancy, ISO 2008, referred to as: [ISO 16814:2008]
  • ISO 16818:2008 – Building environment design — Energy efficiency — Terminology, ISO 2008, referred to as: [ISO 16818:2008]
  • ISO 24294:2021- Timber — Round and sawn timber — Vocabulary, referred to as: [ISO 24294:2021]