The COVID-19 pandemic

[tomh009]

Last Thursday's announcements included $50 million (new money I think, not reserves, assuming I'm reading it correctly) provincially for HVAC.

https://news.ontario.ca/edu/en/2020/08/o...staff.html

The money is there, but there are thousands of schools across the county. There is surely no way to get all of that up and running by September. CTV states there are over 4800 public schools in Ontario alone. How do they plan on sourcing all the parts or brand new HVAC units (which are surely in dire need...schools can barely stay heated in winter) never mind install and test them all before September? That's a couple weeks away. I doubt there are even enough certified HVAC technicians in Ontario to tackle a job this big.

It's only $10K per school, which will not pay for any kind of a new HVAC system. I would guess a school-sized HVAC system would cost well over $100K, even for a smallish school. It's really just a top-up for the existing funding levels.

The most cost-effective option could be the addition of HEPA filtration for existing HVAC systems. Maybe. HEPA filtration is equivalent to an N100 mask, filtering out 99.97% of 0.3um particles. N95 masks filter out 95% of those.