US 5,761,908 AGranted

Apparatus suited for ventilating rooms contaminated with infectious disease organisms

AssigneeAir Quality Engineering

InventorsHeidi D. Oas, Dennis E. Welch

Life of this patent

Estimating the term…

Loading patent…

Abstract

A self-contained ventilation apparatus is disclosed for ventilating buildings, e.g., patient rooms such as hospital rooms, waiting rooms, hospital operating rooms, doctors' offices, and clinics, especially rooms contaminated with infectious microorganisms. One or more blowers is provided. When there are two blowers, a first blower is provided for discharging room air to the atmosphere and a second blower is provided for introducing fresh outside air to the room to provide a continuous supply of fresh air to the room which is free of disease organisms. Both streams of air pass through an air-to-air heat exchanger to adjust the temperature of the incoming air to approach that exhausted from the room. When filters are used, both currents of air are preferably filtered, e.g., with a high efficiency particle air (HEPA) filter. Provision is made for automatically maintaining room air pressure at the desired value (typically below that of surrounding rooms) as filters gradually become clogged with dust. Supplemental heat or cold is supplied to incoming air by locating semiconductive thermoelectric cooling modules between incoming and outgoing air streams. Optional thermoelectric modules also dehumidify or warm incoming air depending on the season.

Claims12

Dependent claims

A portable self-contained ventilation apparatus for a room within a building comprising,

a housing having top, bottom and side walls,
a first blower connected to an exhaust air duct communicating between a room exhaust inlet and a room exhaust outlet opening for expelling room air to the atmosphere outside of the building,
a second blower connected to a fresh air inlet duct communicating between an outside air inlet and a fresh air outlet opening for feeding fresh outside air into the building,
an air filter within at least one of said air inlet and exhaust air ducts for filtering, the air passing therethrough,
a heat exchanger operatively connected between said ducts for exchanging heat between the fresh air in the inlet duct and the exhaust air passing through the exhaust air duct,
blower speed control means connected to at least one of the blowers for changing the speed of said one blower,
a sensor operatively connected to the blower speed control means said control means maintains a pressure differential between atmospheric air and the air within the room as the filter gradually become plunged with particulate material, and
at least one semiconductive thermoelectric cooling module is located externally of the heat exchanger in heat transfer relationship with the flesh air in the inlet duct and a source of electric current is connected to said module to thereby heat or cool said fresh air.

5 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.