pollution

This paper examines some designs which lead to indoor air pollution and exhorts mandatory maintenance of all building services which determine the health and safety of the building occupants as anintegral part of our city bylaws. Effect of poor maintenance of some of these systems on the indoor air quality is examined together with the effect of the interruption of the ventilation fans for energy conservation pwrposes, not always done legally.

Outdoor air pollution can have a bearing on the effectiveness of indoor air and the quality of ventilation. There is a pressing need to reflect on the potential type and effect of occurrences (e.g. smog, or chemical accidents) and to develop technical, operational and organisational measures which must be taken with mechanical ventilation units in the case of polluted outdoor air situations. A polluted outdoor air situation is present when a ventilation process leads to the intake of pollutants in the interior and to the enrichment of these pollutants to an unacceptably high concentration.

This overview explains why indoor air quality (lAQ) has recently attracted so much attention what are the major sources of indoor air pollution, and what are the health effects of concern. It discusses differences among occupational, outdoor, and indoor air pollution problems including some of the different measurement needs. It also covers the total exposure concept, and discusses the California IAQ Program. Emerging trends in indoor air quality measurement techniques are presented in the final part of the paper.

Two new units, the olf and the decipol, are introduced to quantify air pollution sources and air pollution perceived by humans indoors and outdoors. The olf is introduced to quantify pollution sources. One olf is the emission rate of air pollutants (bioeffluents) from a standard person. Any other pollution source is quantified by the number of standard persons (olfs) required to cause the same dissatisfaction as the actual pollution source. The olf unit is analogous to lumen and watt for light and noise sources.