Basic Documentation

Chapter 1—Introduction
Chapter 1 introduces the topic of room pressurization and discusses the:
• Importance of Room Pressurization
• Objective of this Application Guide
• Intended Audience
Importance of Room Pressurization
Proper room pressurization is an absolute necessity to ensure occupant health and safety as
well as preserve the purity and integrity of an increasing array of manufactured products. In
healthcare facilities, proper room pressurization is vital for protecting workers and patients
from exposure to harmful and, sometimes, deadly airborne pathogens. Room pressurization
is an important factor in guarding against occupant and worker exposure to hazardous fumes
and biological agents in many types of laboratories. Additionally, proper room pressurization
is necessary to prevent cross contamination and ensure that the required level of
environmental sterility and purity is maintained for food and drug processing, and in micro-
electronic and optical manufacturing industries.
With the ever-increasing focus on ensuring occupant protection and the increasingly stringent
needs for environmental purity in production facilities, maintaining proper room pressurization
is a key requirement for facility ventilation systems. This has imposed increased responsibility
on the ventilation system designer as well as the facility operational staff to ensure that
ventilation systems are able to provide and continue to provide the required levels of room
pressurization.
Objective of this Application Guide
This Application Guide is intended to serve as a comprehensive reference to room
pressurization. It provides information ranging from the fundamental concept of room
pressurization though the design and configuration of room pressurization ventilation
systems, and their associated control systems. The information in this guide is applicable to
chemical and biological laboratories, animal research facilities, hospital isolation and
treatment rooms, industrial clean rooms, pharmaceutical processing areas, and virtually any
application where maintaining a specific static pressure relationship to another internal area
or to the outdoors is desired.
Siemens Building Technologies, Inc. 1