Inequality of water consumption for hygienic and sanitary purposes in production halls

Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Environmental Engineering, Wybrzeże Wyspiańskiego 27, 50–370, Wroclaw, Poland

^* Corresponding author: edyta.dudkiewicz@pwr.edu.pl

Abstract

Water consumption in hall buildings is substantial and characterised by variability over the time: yearly, seasonality, monthly, weekly, daily, hourly and second. Both, water consumption and their irregularity, influence on many processes and technical issues. Purposes for which water is consumed are various. Beyond the technological processes, one of the most water-intensive demand is need for water for hygienic and sanitary purposes, especially in production buildings with high degree of soiling work. The paper presents the study of hot water (DHW) consumption and its profile for sanitary and hygienic purposes in two production halls. The halls vary in the degree of soiling work, sanitary equipment and numbers of employees. The aim of this article is to define DHW consumption profiles and hourly water-consumption irregularity coefficient applicable in design process of hot water preparation for hygienic purposes in production buildings. The average daily hot water consumption varies significantly and amounts 7 or 16 m³ respectively to both halls. Despite the discrepancy of sanitary equipment and number of workers the hourly water-consumption irregularity coefficients for both halls are in the similar range, about 2, and daily domestic hot water profiles present typically three main consumption peaks that occur at the end of work shifts.