On Thursday Gillian asked:
" Is there a 'rule of thumb' for estimating the cost of temperature and humidity control for a cubic area of Archive?"
I took the liberty of forwarding the query on to a colleague of mine who builds custom vaulting (some are in the UK). Hugh is very knowledgeable about all matters related to vaults, down below is his response.
Hugh can be contacted at [log in to unmask] his company info can be found at http://www.firelock.com
PeterK
Virginia
Dear Gillian
Here are my responses as Peter asked me to reply to this from my
experience. We do not sell or install this equipment but we have to
specify it for our vaults and I see the pricing enough to have a good
idea of pricing.
>> Is there a 'rule of thumb' for estimating the cost of temperature and
>> humidity control for a cubic area of Archive? We want to install full
>> temperature and humidity control, but would like some idea of what
>> the costs are going to be.
This depends on the level of control you wish to provide. For example
if the vault is between 20' x 20' x 10' up to 20' x 40' x 10' then the
cost would be approximately $16,000 to provide 68º F- 70º F (20ºC) with
a rigidly controlled relative humidity of 30% which is the ideal for
long term storage of microfilm and computer media. If the room goes up
larger than this volume then the price will go up by small increments
as you already have the base equipment.
>>
>> Also, the room already has air conditioning fitted (the room
>> previously housed lots of people and lots of computers), does anyone
>> know if it is likely to be possible to fit humidity control as a
>> separate item?
You can add a HC-150 Dessicant Dehumidifer to the system and the unit
will cost about $4,000 plus the installation which would be about
another $1,000 from our experience.
>> And if possible, is it a good idea?
I see no disadvantage to reusing the existing equipment as long as its
capacity is right for the room. Remember that the computers created a
great deal of heat so people in the same space may not create the same
heat load. (Just leave a window open to the outside :~) )
I hope this is helpful. since Peter has to always tell me all the
records management stuff i thought this might repay the favors I owed
him with this little bit of experience I have.
Best of Luck.
Hugh
Peter A. Kurilecz CRM, CA
Richmond, Va
[log in to unmask]
|