The effects of barometric relief dampers on internal static pressure, air quality, and energy consumption for a typical large-scale retail building

In order to prevent building over-pressurization, many roof-top units on large-scale retail buildings are equipped with barometric relief dampers. In this study, the effects of barometric relief dampers on internal static pressure, indoor air quality, and heating and cooling energy consumption for a typical large-scale retail building were investigated. The airflow characteristics of barometric relief dampers (i.e., the relationship between pressure drop and airflow rate) were first determined and incorporated into a building simulation model, which consisted of several thermal zones. The integration of building thermal simulation, multizone network method, and computational fluid dynamics was employed to perform the analysis. From the simulation results, it was found that the barometric relief dampers reduced building internal excess pressure by up to 7%. The CO ₂ concentrations were decreased up to 3% in the heating season, and the decrements were much less during the cooling season. This was primarily due to the additional fresh air infiltration entering the front entrance doors, caused largely by the presence of barometric relief dampers. Finally, for ASHRAE Climate Zone 4A, annual heating energy consumption was increased by 2%; however, the effect on annual cooling energy consumption was negligible.