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Automatic Doors: A Sustainable Approach to Modern Hygienic Buildings

By: Suresh Panneerselvam, Auto Ingress India Private Limited

Contemporary Challenges In Building Industry Sector

Use of mechanical door handles, manual operation of the door can many times be exasperating. It may not be on top of mind for people to close doors every time. This situation is not only inconvenient for day-to-day use, but also jeopardise the safety and security of the building and its occupants.

The manually operated doors are also prone to hazards of cross-contamination in areas where hygiene is of paramount importance for buildings such as hospitals, laboratories, food processing units, public access doors and toilets. Unlike common users, opening and closing of a manually operated door could be arduous for people with special needs such as wheelchair users, children, senior citizens, the disabled and the like.

The carbon footprint is yet another challenge prevailing across the word. Global inventions are focussed towards a greener and more sustainable environment. Manually operated doors when left open, pose a major threat, leading to increased power consumption costs and further adding to global carbon footprints; the damaging effects of which are alarming.

Need Of The Hour

Smart entrance solutions that can ensure complete safety, security, comfort, convenience, hygiene of building occupants and at the same time yield sustainable return of investments for end users such as optimizing emergency costs and reduce carbon footprints for the community as a whole.

Why Choose An Automatic Door System?

Automatic entrances are not only the preferred choice of specifying community, such as architects, planners and consultants, but also for the builders, promoters and end-users for the following reasons:

• Automatic doors ensure complete safety of its users as it has many built-in plus optional safety features for day-today applications
• The integrated electric locking mechanisms ensure that the security of the building entrances are given utmost attention
• Automatic doors are extremely reliable and comfortable to use for people of all groups may it be abled (or) disabled, young (or) old and these doors do not discriminate between the users and offers convenient barrier-free access to buildings
• Automatic door is the need of the hour especially in areas that calls for extreme hygienic conditions. Some of these applications include automatic doors in intensive care units, operation theatres, isolation wards, blood bank, testing laboratories, pharmaceutical units, food processing units, public transit systems, airports where the risk of cross-contamination is exceptionally hig

• Automatic doors are rapidly gaining importance in toilets, especially for disabled users in public as well as commercial buildings such as airports, shopping malls, hotels, IT companies, factories, etc.

• Automatic panic breakout doors are the most widely used applications for effectively and quickly evacuating building occupants in case of an emergency such as fire and smoke. They are gaining more popularity in areas such as airports, metro, shopping centres, etc.

Application Areas Of Automatic System In Modern Era:

• Automatic doors are being used widely in mass public transport systems such as platform screen doors in metros as well as the doors in metro compartments
• Automatic doors are also used for providing convenient, safe and regulated access in areas such as rapid bus transport system
• Automatic garage doors are being used in villas and private properties which can be controlled and activated using a smart mobile app such as home automation systems
• Automatic window systems are being used these days for common and natural ventilation in both commercial and residential applications
• Further, the most modern commercial buildings and public buildings such as airports make use of automatic window systems that can be automatically be triggered and operated as smoke ventilation in case of fire and smoke.

Other Areas Of Application And Scope Of Building Automation

• Automation of gates which not just adds to the comfort of users, but also secures the perimeter of the building which is the prime point of entrance to the building

• Automatic Boom barriers that can regulate the entry and exit of people in areas such as parking plaza, building entrances of IT companies, factories, residential apartments, toll plaza to mention a few.
• Automatic flap barriers/ half-height gates that can be used for restricted access controlled entrances for use in areas like airports, IT companies, commercial buildings, multiplex, transport systems such as metro

Key Benefits Of Automatic Doors In Hygiene-Sensitive Areas

Automated hermetic door systems are the best solution to help patients and clinical staff move within healthcare facilities in a safe, efficient and convenient manner. Automatic hermetic doors have gained popularity in healthcare units due to the numerous advantages they offer.

Below mentioned are some of the reasons why these doors are increasingly preferred:

Automatic doors are rapidly gaining importance in toilets

One of the many ways that the bacterial and viral infections spread is through physical contact of objects by hand; particularly on the most frequently used building components such as doors. Automated hermetic doors are ideal for infection control areas such as hospitals, due to the fact they eliminate the need to touch the door surface, therefore reducing the high risk of crosscontamination.

These doors also offer greater convenience for staff as they can use touch-free activations such as foot sensors, hand-wave sensors, etc., without the need to open or touch doors physically. They are predominantly useful for use in hygiene critical areas such as operating theatres, intensive care units and isolation wards. The surface of these special doors is made of either stainless steel or special coating with an anti-bacterial finish that can eliminate or control the growth of harmful microbes.

Functionality

While choosing automatic doors, you don’t have to sacrifice form for function. With a wide range of configurations, designs and activation options to choose from, it’s easy to find a solution to suit your individual needs.

Compliance To Disabled Discriminate Act

Automatic doors improve access for everyone, regardless of their physical capabilities. The introduction of the International Disability Discrimination Act, and Regulations laid by the National Building Code of India (Version 2016), have made it mandatory for companies to install automatic doors in order to ensure compliance, especially in public access buildings.

Safety And Convenience

On proper installation, serviced and maintenance as per manufacturer recommendations, automatic doors consistently provide safe, reliable and convenient access for users. The automatic system ensures effortless operation and eliminates the inconvenience of opening heavy manual doors such as fire doors, AHU doors and clean room doors.

Energy Savings

Sustainability is a major concern in modern construction such as green buildings and automated doors help in saving energy by ensuring that doors are kept closed – safely and securely. Automatic doors open and close only when a user activates them through sensors or other controlled activation device such as push button and this prevents the doors from being left open resulting in heating or air conditioning costs.

Automatic doors help to achieve LEED points for green buildings not only for energy savings but also for maintaining the ideal indoor air quality. Automatic doors can be tailor made and custom-built to suit the individual requirements of the customers. Further bespoke after sales service and maintenance contracts are being offered to ensure reliable functioning and durability of automatic doors.