Narrow Opening

This article discusses about a requirement that aims to protect occupants from dangerous smoke concentrations and keep escape routes clear in a building that houses a restaurant in Zurich, Switzerland. It has to be ventilated with windows in the roof that open automatically in case of fire. For a substantial building, the difference between automated venting for one percent and two percent of a roof surface can represent tens of thousands of dollars. The AFC Air Flow Consulting hired by the restaurant uses computational fluid dynamics and visualization software to improve construction and product design before too much time or money is committed. The company has provided solutions for flow problems ranging from cold downdraft along facades to droplet dispersion. A field of growing interest for AFC is industrial engineering. The company optimizes the airflow to accommodate various parameters in technical parts, such as the airflow in a medical inhaler for homogeneous distribution of droplets, or the air intake device of a car ventilation system for water separation.