Shelves filled with old artifacts sit under an air conditioning vent in a storage room

The collection storage facility for the Autonomous Entity of Museums and Centers of the Island Government of Tenerife (Valle de Guerra, Tenerife, Spain) occupies the second floor of a contemporary four-story concrete building located on the northeast hillside of the island. The space (437 square meters with 3-meter ceiling) is divided into five rooms with windows located only on the northwest and northeast walls. The northeast side of the room faces the Atlantic Ocean, while a narrow paved road brackets the northwest side of the structure. The stored collection consists of ceramic potteries, basketries, wooden and metal tools, textiles, and modern machinery, and is managed by Maria Garcia Morales, the organization's conservator.

Prior to this project, the environment of the facility storage area was not controlled. The climate-control system installed at Valle de Guerra consists of three sets of supply and exhaust fans, five convective heaters, and three humidistats. A local HVAC company carried out the detailed mechanical design and the selection of equipment. Since there was no possibility of installing windows on either the southwest or southeast wall to achieve cross ventilation, supply air was taken from the northwest wall and transferred via ventilation duct to the southeast end of the room, where it was released into the space. The exhaust ventilators are mounted on the existing windows of the northeast wall.

The climate-control system at Valle de Guerra has been in operation since August 2002. Although relative humidity has been maintained below 75% since installation, large climatic variation exists among the rooms. Several minor modifications were performed, and from January 2004 to September 2005 RH levels in the four rooms were maintained at or below 70% for roughly 80% of the period of the study interval.

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