Impact of Number of Opening Sides on Air Quality in Semi-open Space of Community Mall

Abstract

Air quality is a significant issue that has an impact on people’s health and way of life. The dust problem and covid-19 pandemic have caused people to avoid high-density areas such as enclosed shopping malls and turn to choose community malls instead. People see a community mall as a comfortable location because of its physical characteristics of semi-open space. However, there has been no research on community malls on other aspects of comfort such as air quality. The objective of this research is to look at how the number of opening sides of a community mall and wind direction affects air quality by evaluating pollutant levels. The case study building in Bangkok was simulated by the Computational Fluid Dynamics program. The number of opening sides of the building that enable air to flow through is used to group case study buildings.
According to the CFD simulation, buildings with 4 opening sides have the lowest pollution concentration that an average ratio between indoor and outdoor pollutant concentration (I/O ratio) of 0.55 and an air change rate of 123.75 ACH. It signifies that the air quality in this building is better than in other case studies that have an average I/O ratio close to or above 1. In Addition, the orientation of the building, the direction of the wind, and the building context are all important factors in airflow. The findings of this study led to design guidelines for community malls or other buildings with semi-open space.