indoor air quality / air purification / air ventilation / well building standard / healthy building / wellness interior / air quality monitors (kaiterra)

Image shows a Kaiterra indoor air quality monitor

Why does indoor air quality matter for our health?

A simple question but one worth asking upfront. As many of us now spend the majority of our lives indoors, somewhere between home, the office, gym, restaurants, school and so on, the quality of the indoor air we breathe in those places matters because indoor air pollutants can cause headaches, sore throat, a loss in productivity / concentration levels, itchy eyes or asthma attacks in the short-term.

In more serious instances, there is a tangible risk of long-term health concerns such as cancer and respiratory issues. All that is before we introduce the theme of viruses.

common indoor air pollutants

Indoor air pollutants we watch out for include CO2, carbon monoxide, radon, tobacco smoke, mold and chemical off-gases known as Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs). Particulate Matter PM2.5 and PM10 are made up of dust and synthetic materials decomposing around us from furniture, fabrics and so on. PM1 are extremely fine particles and include air-borne diseases such as COVID-19.

sources of indoor air contaminants

The primary sources of these contaminants include toxic building materials, paints, finishes, adhesives, chemical-based cleaning products, fire retardant furniture and fabrics, even our shoes can drag in dust and dirt particles from outside, while nail varnish, aerosols and certain low grade perfumes also negatively impact the indoor air quality in a building.

How does outside air affect indoor air quality in a building?

There is an increasing amount of data available now on the real time quality of our outdoor air in many major cities, with a little research online it’s possible to track down extremely detailed air quality maps of your home city, available both on desktop and mobile app formats.

In London for example, there is an impressive network of outdoor air quality monitors set up by one of the universities there. It operates under the London Air moniker:

https://www.londonair.org.uk/LondonAir/Default.aspx

What you'll often find is that there are very different air quality readings according to the seasons, weather conditions, day of the week, even time of day, depending on commuter numbers, industrial activity in the vicinity and so on, versus the relative respite of a Sunday morning outdoor air quality reading for example.

Equally, low cloud cover can compress and hold down smog closer to street level rather than allowing it to dissipate upwards as on a clear day.

Natural ventilation strategies and indoor air quality

According to the type of windows installed in a commercial building, on a day when the outdoor air quality is suitably. high, there may be the option of using natural ventilation rather than an energy-intensive air conditioning system to ventilate an indoor space. If the outdoor air quality is particularly poor, this solution only serves to make matters worse indoors, clearly.

smart apps for indoor air quality management

A new generation of smart apps that can recommend when to open windows and allow outdoor air in are increasingly popular in India and China, a response to the critical air quality situation in some of the major cities there - easily the worst offenders at a global scale.

We expect this technology to trickle down to newly launched smart buildings in European and North American capitals over coming months and years.

Indoor Air Quality monitors in a healthy building

We have written extensively about the role of indoor air quality monitors in healthy buildings, not least via our conversation with Liam Bates, CEO of Kaiterra, for episode 040 of the Green & Healthy Places podcast.

Essentially the indoor air quality monitor plan (covering quantity and location) as well as the grade of monitor need to be carefully analyzed in advance of the installation, with them finding a home between 1.2m -1.8m from the floor with hourly data readings covering particle. count, carbon dioxide, VOCs, temperature and humidity.

See also our article on the RESET AIR Standard, from our perspective as RESET Accredited Professionals.

Healthy Building Standards and Indoor Air Quality

There is some degree of negotiation that needs to happen when we're evaluating the impact of People and Planet as an air conditioning HVAC system in a new build is much less damaging to the environment than it would have been 20 years ago when there were harmful hydrocarbons and chemicals involved.

Older buildings, especially those originally built on a low budget, still carry the scars of those mistakes today however, a real problem but one slowly being phased out.

In light of Covid-19, we should view mechanical ventilation systems as our friend, albeit one we’d rather ran on green electricity rather fossil fuels, clearly.

The key to an HVAC, from a healthy building perspective at least, are its filters and ventilation rates. That is where the magic happens, these can be UV light, or a physical filter that's catching dust particles, removing bacteria and harmful VOCs (chemical off-gasses) from the air.

This is in addition clearly to thermal regulation to ensure occupants are comfortable, according to the type of activity they are engaged in - be that working, sleeping or working out!

In terms of energy consumption, the issue is that these systems can, if not monitored and programmed smartly with something like a Kaiterra system, be left on all day and night, even when not strictly needed.

The ideal healthy building for indoor air

The absolute apex of all this is a passive or Net Zero building that has been designed to deliberately make use of natural wind patterns, daylight and sunshine to minimize energy expenditure. To some extent we’re waiting for the green energy revolution to catch up but examples of these smart, future-proof buildings have started to emerge, many of them having followed the International Living Future Institute’s Living Building Challenge.

Well Building Standard on Indoor Air Quality

WELL’s chapter on air quality is a comprehensive review of the subject (see here) whilst their guidelines on Particulate Matter and VOC levels are included below for reference:

https://standard.wellcertified.com/air/air-quality-standards

Standards for Volatile Substances

Formaldehyde levels less than 27 ppb and Total volatile organic compounds less than 500 μg/m³.

Standards for Particulate Matter and Inorganic Gases

Carbon monoxide less than 9 ppm.

PM₂.₅ less than 15 μg/m³.

PM₁₀ less than 50 μg/m³.

Ozone less than 51 ppb.

Standard for Radon

Radon less than 0.148 Bq/L [4 pCi/L] in the lowest occupied level of the project.

What is Indoor Air Quality (IAq) in a healthy building?