Minutes

The meeting was convened by Chair Steve Bassett at 3:00 pm. A quorum of nine voting members was present.

Voting Members Present:

Steve Bassett, Bob Andrews, Jim Cummings, Mike McCombs, Don Pittman and Pete Quintela, Joe Crum, Gary Griffin and Betsy Goll.

Meeting Activities:

The minutes of the 2/5/06 meeting and the agenda were approved.

Consideration of DEC request DCA06-DEC-182 by Michael Thompson of CHPA Consulting Engineers Incorporated ensued. The project at issue is a 31 story, 750 room guest tower and a 450,000 s.f. convention center expansion to the Peabody Hotel located on International Drive in Orlando, Florida. Proponent proposes to make up the typical guest suite bathroom exhaust by supplying preconditioned ventilation air within the corridor by way of vertical 100% outside air duct risers and asks questions about whether this is allowed by code.

Discussion of the matter included the following issues. The guest room corridor should be viewed as occupiable space because people work there on a regular basis. NFPA 90A allows this practice, as did the 2001 Florida Building Code-Mechanical . Section 403.2.2 of the 2004 FBC-Mechanical states that the required outdoor air rate specified in Table 403.3 shall be introduced directly into such spaces or into the occupied spaces from which air is transferred or a combination of both. Section 601.2 prohibits corridors from serving supply, return, exhaust, relief or ventilation air ducts, with exceptions; exception 1 allows use of a corridor as a source of makeup air for exhaust systems in rooms that open directly onto such corridor including toilet rooms, smoking lounges, closets, etc. Section 602.1 limits supply, return, exhaust, relief and ventilation air plenums to uninhabited crawl spaces, areas above a ceiling or below the floor, attic spaces and mechanical equipment rooms.

On a motion by Crum with a second by Andrews, the TAC voted 7-2 to recommend the following responses to the Florida Building Commission:

To the question, “Is the guest room corridor an occupied space?” the answer is NO, Section 602.1 defines plenums as being unoccupiable spaces and cavities; thus, a corridor is never a plenum.

To the question, “Does the referenced code allow the transfer of bathroom exhaust make up air from the corridor to the guest room?” the answer is NO, Section 601.2 prohibits corridors from serving as supply, return, exhaust, relief or ventilation air ducts except in rooms that open directly onto such corridors, including toilet rooms, bathrooms, dressing rooms, smoking lounges and janitor closets.

To the question, “Does the referenced code allow the transfer of bathroom exhaust from the guest room to the bathroom?” the answer is YES, the code does allow transfer of air from the guest room to be used for bathroom exhaust.

To the question, “Does the referenced code allow the bathroom exhaust to be supplied through the corridor?”, the answer is NO, not unless the bathroom opens directly onto the corridor.

Adjournment

The meeting was adjourned at 3:50 p.m.