The Inter-Rater and Intra-Rater Reliability of the Actual Aquatic Skills Test (AAST) for Assessing Young Children’s Motor Competence in the Water

As children’s actual aquatic skills are important for the prevention of drowning as well as their engagement in lifelong aquatic physical activity, researchers and practitioners should be able to assess this vital concept accurately and reliably. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the inter-rater and intra-rater reliability of the Actual Aquatic Skills Test (AAST), consisting of 17 different test items for the assessment of young children’s motor competence in the water. Six raters received a training and evaluation session on scoring the AAST, after which five of them assessed four test videos (of various children (n = 38) performing the test items) twice, with one to two weeks in between (i.e., test and re-test). Inter-rater and intra-rater reliability were determined per test video and for the different AAST test items across videos using Gwet’s Agreement Coefficient 2 (Gwet’s AC2). The Gwet’s AC2 for inter-rater reliability at the test varied from 0.414 to 1.000, indicating a moderate to perfect agreement between raters. For intra-rater reliability, it ranged from 0.628 to 1.000, demonstrating a good to perfect agreement between test and re-test scoring. In conclusion, the AAST is a promising tool to reliably assess young children’s actual aquatic skills in an indoor swimming pool.

Improving Water Efficiency in a Municipal Indoor Swimming-Pool Complex: A Case Study

This study aimed to determine the water demand of a municipal swimming pool complex to propose water use efficiency measures. Concomitantly, the possibility of recycling and reusing the water from filter backwashing was evaluated. The pools consumed 25.6% of water, the filter backwashing 24.5%, and the showers 34.7%. Despite the current impossibility of reducing water consumption in pools and filter backwashing, it is feasible to promote more efficient use of water through reducing water consumption by adopting simple water-saving initiatives for showers, taps, and flushing cisterns. These were organized into three distinct scenarios: (a) flushing cistern volume adjustment and the replacement of washbasin and kitchen taps; (b) flushing cistern volume adjustment and shower replacement and (c) flushing cistern volume adjustment, shower, washbasin, and kitchen taps replacement. Under scenarios 1, 2, and 3, the water consumption reduction was 8.0, 13.2, and 20.4%, respectively. The initial investment for scenario 1 was €2290.5, €859.0 for scenario 2 and €3149.5 for scenario 3; the annual water bill reduction was €7115.4, €11,518.1, and €17,655.9, respectively. Therefore, the turnover of the investment was four (scenario 1), one (scenario 2), and three months (scenario 3). The filter washings attained the required standard for irrigation after being subjected to 15 h of sedimentation.

Comparison of conventional and passive public utility buildings in Poland

Poland sees the increasing popularisation of sustainable housing and the growing awareness of the importance of sport development. A good physical condition of residents translates into effective work, whereas caring for the environment improves living standards. Introducing healthy lifestyle from an early age has the best results. Due to this fact in Poland every school has its own sports hall. The pilot programme to build swimming pools near every primary school was introduced in Lower-Silesian district and it is called ‘Dolnośląski Delfinek’ (Lower Silesian Little Dolphin). Swimming pool buildings are characterised by high demand for heat. Their operation burdens district budgets and indirectly every taxpayer. Those facilities are occasionally rented commercially to earn some money for maintenance expenses. The costs usually exceed the income of those buildings. The article discusses results of thermo-vision (infrared) tests and presents the analysis of the technical documentation of twenty eight public utility buildings located in Poland. The investigations encompass conventional, energy-saving and passive buildings. The conventional buildings described in the work are school swimming pools from the programme ‘Dolnośląski Delfinek’ (Lower-Silesian Little Dolphin), whereas energy-saving and passive buildings include office, industrial, hotel, educational and sports buildings (including an indoor swimming pool). This article aims to find the most effective design manner and energy-saving sports buildings construction such as swimming pools. The results obtained in the tests indicate the necessity of compliance with the energy-saving technology in the design and construction of public utility buildings. A conclusion arises that swimming pool buildings are the most suitable candidates for passive buildings.

Feasibility Study and Economic Analysis of a Fuel-Cell-Based CHP System for a Comprehensive Sports Center with an Indoor Swimming Pool

Unlike a general commercial building, heating for a building with an indoor swimming pool is highly energy-intensive due to the high energy demand for swimming water heating. In Korea, the conventional heating method for this kind of building is to use boilers and heat storage tanks that have high fuel costs and greenhouse gas emissions. In this study, a combined heat and power (CHP) system for such a building using the electricity and waste heat from a Phosphoric Acid Fuel Cell (PAFC) system was designed and analyzed in terms of its primary energy saving, CO2 reduction, fuel cell and CHP efficiency, and economic feasibility. The mathematical model of the thermal load evaluation was used with the 3D multi-zone building model in TRNSYS 18 software (Thermal Energy System Specialists, LLC, Madison, MI, USA) to determine the space heating demand and swimming pool heat losses. The energy efficiency of the fuel cell unit was evaluated as a function of the part-load ratio from the operating data. The fundamental components, such as the auxiliary boiler, thermal storage tank, and heat exchanger are also integrated for the simulation of the system’s operation. The result shows that the system has a high potential to improve the utilization efficiency of fuel cell energy production. Referring to the local condition of the energy market in Korea, an economic analysis was also carried out by using a specific FC-CHP capacity at 440 kW. The economic benefit is significant in comparison with a conventional heating system, especially for the full-time operating (FTO) mode. The net profit made by comparison with the conventional energy supply system is about 178,352 to 273,879 USD per year, and the payback period is expected to be 6.9 to 10.7 years under different market conditions.

Feasibility of Grey Water Heat Recovery in Indoor Swimming Pools

Swimming pools are used around the world for recreational, rehabilitation and physical activity. From an energy and environmental standpoint, grey water as a waste thermal potential of swimming pools is a valuable heat source produced continuously in extensive, measurable and large quantities. The main objective of this article is to analyse the feasibility of proposed grey water heat recovery (GWHR) system from the showers and backwater from swimming pool filters for an indoor pool located in recreation centre in Poland. Analysis, calculations and results were obtained and discussions of water and energy consumption were carried out for the mentioned indoor swimming pool on the basis of real measurements case study for water flow rate, water temperature in swimming pools and showers. The results ensure a significant potential of energy savings by using the proposed GWHR system, which allows to reduce the energy demand by 34% up to 67% for pool water preheating and domestic hot water (DHW). The environmental impact of proposed GWHR system was analysed and calculated by using Common Air Quality Index. Environmental results are illustrated and discussed specially for the reduction of CO2, NOX, SOX emissions and dust and ensure a significant reduction of these pollutants in range of 34% to 48%.

Thermal Performance Prediction of Indoor Swimming Pool Solar Heating System Using Different Types of Flat-Plate Solar Collectors

The current study includes a theoretical study of the enfluence of different types of flat-plate solar collector on the solar fraction factor (ƒ) of a proposed solar heating system used for heating "alShaab Olympic Indoor Swimming Pool" located in Baghdad (Iraq) at a latitude of 33.32˚N. The swimming pool building has external dimensions of 95 m length, 51 m width, and 16.5 m height, it contains two pools, the first is for swimming with dimensions of (50 m * 21 m) with fixed depth of 1.8 m, the second is for diving with an irregular surface area of (351) m2 and with depth of 5 m. The Total thermal losses from the two pools to the pool hall and from the pool hall to the outdoor environment were calculated for four months of winter season (November, December, January and February) and a computer program was built using the MATLAB (R2008a) environment to solve the mathematical model equations in order to calculate the solar fraction facor (ƒ) of the proposed solar heating system at different solar collecting areas which are (2000,2500,3000,3500,4000,4500,5000,6000,7000,8000,9000,10000) m2 and at five different types of flat-plate solar collector which are (A: one cover black solar collector, B: one cover selective absorber solar collector, C: two cover black solar collector, D: two cover selective absorber solar collector, and E: pool absorber (PVC) solar collector). The results obtained showed that the highest values of solar fraction factor were obtained when using the solar collector type D, and the lowest values obtained when using the solar collector type E. The values of solar fraction factor (ƒ) of the proposed solar heating system, at solar collecting area of 10000m2 and at mass storage of water in the storage tank of 25 kg/m2 collecting area, for type D are 84.27 % for November, 72.74% for December, 69.4% for January, and 82.91% for February, and for type E are 56.14% for November, 41.15% for December, 37.17% for January, and 50.6% for February.

Numerical Analysis of the Energy Consumption of Ventilation Processes in the School Swimming Pool

Ventilation of an indoor swimming pool is a very energy consuming process. This is a result of, among other things the required high value of the ventilation air volume flow rate, calculated on the basis of the moisture gains in the facility. The total energy consumption consists of the heat required to heat this air and the electricity needed to transport it. It is possible to reduce the ventilation air volume flow rate by assuming the correct value of specific humidity of the supply and indoor air, but then a deterioration of thermal-moisture conditions in the building can be expected. The aim of this paper was to examine how the reduction of the supply air volume flow rate affects the energy consumption for indoor swimming pool ventilation. It was also checked how this consumption can be reduced by using two-stage heat recovery in the air handling unit. Multi-variant simulations of energy consumption for indoor swimming pool ventilation were carried out using the IDA ICE software for day and night operation of the swimming pool throughout the year. The results of the research proved that reduction of the supply air volume flow rate resulted in the lower energy expenditure on ventilation. The variant with additional local air supply to the lifeguard zone was also analysed, which caused only a slight increase in energy demand for ventilation.