You are the Health and Safety Advisor for an industrial warehouse company shipping items to members of the public. During COVID business has astronomically increased!

Previously, there was a bit of packaging/repackaging activity right in the warehouse, but due to the general safety concern of having too many new packers on the warehouse floor, management requested a dedicated work area for just packing. A new separated space next to the warehouse will be provided.

A Project Manager has estimated there will be 20 employees in this new 5000 square foot / 75,000 cubic foot space.

1. List top-3 basic questions you need to ask about the HVAC system (short bullet points):
2. Calculate the ventilation per person normally needed in cfm / person:
3. An HVAC specialist tells you that you can get 4000 cfm in the space. How many air exchanges does that equal to in the room?
4. COVID is an additional concern, and the HVAC specialist indicates that with affordable adjustments to the existing system (i.e. the owners dont want to put in a band new HVAC unit) you can get to a MERV 11 or 12 filtration. This is just short of the recommended MERV 13 for COVID. What should you ask the HVAC specialist to compensate for this difference (short bullet points)?

Assume your situation falls into ASHREA shipping/receiving with 20 employees, 5000 square foot, 75,000 cubic foot EXAMPLES Formula #1 (cfm/person): CFM Needed = (cfm /person x person / 1000 ft sq) + (cfm rate x room size ft sq) e.g. a day care that is 2000 sq feet with 10 kids + 2 teachers would be (see ASHRAE link: (10x25) + (0.18x2000) = 250 + 360 = 610 cfm and converting cfm/person to the actual number of people in that space: 610 cfm / 12 persons = 51 cfm / person

Formula #2 (number of air exchanges): ACH = ((100 CFM x 30%) x 60) / (10x10x8) ACH = (30 CFM x 60) / 800 cubic feet ACH = 1,800 cubic feet / 800 cubic feet ACH = 2.25 (round nearest exchange or 2)