Lindab focuses on energy penalty of leaking ducts
Lindab has launched a campaign to raise awareness of air leakage from ductwork and its associated energy penalties. A certain amount of duct leakage has always been tolerated, and plant has been oversized to allow for these losses.
Iain Robertson, joint managing director of Lindab, says, ‘That’s no longer acceptable in the face of the Government’s demands for ever-lower carbon emissions. The average UK ductwork system in the UK has a Class B leakage rate at best. In most cases, it’s only Class A. Ironically, under increasing pressure to save energy, focus has been on the plant side rather than the ducting, with complex and ingenious solutions from inverter drives to proportionally controlled fans.
‘It’s a serious problem; increasing air tightness from Class A to Class C gives a 9-fold reduction in leakage rates. That means savings in fan-power costs of around 30% and energy savings of up to 15% for heating and cooling.’
Lindab is confident that it can provide designers with a solution that can achieve even better results — using its Safe and Safe Click systems of circular ductwork.
Tests at BSRIA on a closed ductwork systems with Safe connections achieved a higher pressure rating compared to an identical system of circular ductwork sealed in the conventional way. At a static duct pressure of 500 Pa, the leakage from the Safe system was over 40% less than the other system. The tests showed that the Safe system achieve Class C.
Safe can achieve air tightness to the former Class D classification — 27 times better than Class A.
