The spread of Coronavirus is causing in the society all around the world a considerable degree of fear, worry and concern and particularly among healthcare workers that are at increased risk for infection. This paper gathers the strategy/guidelines to reduce the contamination in Intensive care unit (ICU) and in all the hospital environment. The ASHRAE and REHVA guidelines applied the UV-C Lamps, Pressure control filtration, Restroom actions and Humidity control to reduce the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) in ICU. The role of infection control in the design of hospitals is increasing every day. This paper highlights the role of heating, ventilating and air-conditioning minimizing the risk of infection from airborne transmission within the built environment through the application of best practices.

We estimated the speed of Zika virus introduction in Brazil by using confirmed cases at the municipal level. Our models indicate a southward pattern of introduction starting from the northeastern coast and a pattern of movement toward the western border with an average speed of spread of 42 km/day or 15,367 km/year.

This article considers the ideal storage conditions for multiple vaccine brands, such as Pfizer, Moderna, CoronaVac, Oxford–AstraZeneca, Janssen COVID-19 and Sputnik V. Refrigerant fluid options for each storage condition, thermal load to cool each type of vaccine and environmental impacts of refrigerants are compared. An energy simulation using the EUED (energy usage effectiveness design) index was developed. The Oxford–AstraZeneca, Janssen COVID-19 and CoronaVac vaccines show 9.34-times higher energy efficiency than Pfizer. In addition, a TEWI (total equivalent warming impact) simulation was developed that prioritizes direct environmental impacts and indirect in refrigeration. From this analysis, it is concluded that the cold storage of Oxford–AstraZeneca, Janssen COVID-19 and CoronaVac vaccines in Brazil generates 35-times less environmental impact than the Pfizer vaccine.

Data Centers are growing steadily worldwide, and they are expected to continue growing up to 53% in 2020. Energy efficiency, in high power consumption, is a key venue. There are methodologies to measure this efficiency, one example is using the PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness) index. In this paper is proposed a new index for measuring efficiency at the design stage, the EUED (Energy Usage Effectiveness Design). This index allows to evaluate systems using "free cooling" and adiabatic system. A comparison is performed considering the equipment in the worst situation. The thermodynamics parameter enthalpy is used to calculate the results. This new methodology allows to determine differences between the cities of São Paulo and Curitiba (1.21%) and between Rio de Janeiro and Curitiba (10.61%). The values for the EUED index were 1.245 kW/kW for Curitiba, 1.260 kW/kW for São Paulo and 1.377 kW/kW for Rio de Janeiro, respectively, reaching a difference of 16.86% for Curitiba, 16.19% for São Paulo and 10.31% for Rio de Janeiro in relation to PUE COA (Power Usage Effectiveness Constant Outdoor Air). The advantage of the EUED is that it works with the 8,760 hours in the design phase, using psychometric elements to determine when to use free cooling and evaporative system, and more importantly varying the COP according to environmental characteristics.

Geothermal heat pumps are broadly used in developed countries but scarcely in Brazil, in part because there is a lack of Brazilian soil temperature data. The aims of this work are: to present soil temperature measurements and to compare geothermal heat pump system performances with conventional air conditioning systems. Geothermal temperature measurement results are shown for ten Paraná State cities, representing di erent soil and climate conditions. The measurements were made yearlong with calibrated equipment and digital data acquisition system in di erent measuring stations. Geothermal and ambient temperature data were used for simulations of the coe cient of performance (COP), by means of a working uid pressure-enthalpy diagram based software for vapor-compression cycle. It was veri ed that geothermal temperature measured between January 13 to October 13, 2013, varied from 16 to 24°C, while room temperature has varied between 2 and 35°C. Average COP values for conventional system were 3.7 (cooling mode) and 5.0 kW/kW (heating mode), corresponding to 5.9 and 7.9 kW/kW for geothermal system. Hence it was veri ed an average e ciency gain of 59% with geothermal system utilization in comparison with conventional system.