Objectives

The focus of the activity is urban & indoor air pollution exposure assessment, seen as part of human health risk assessment and also considering the needs of urban and indoor air quality management. Specific examples of the working areas of ECA are:

• the relative importance of outdoor and indoor sources of pollution,
• the building-related interaction between outdoor urban air and indoor air,
• exposure to pollutants from the different urban outdoor and indoor sources and its relation to health and comfort,
• validation and harmonisation of methodologies and models for assessing human exposure to, and health impact of, stressors of high public concern.

ECA is a widely accepted scientific network at EU level concerning the field of indoor air pollution, human exposure and health for:

• preparing reports summarizing available knowledge of important issues in the aforementioned research fields
• identifying ongoing research within the participating countries and the major research needs
• establishing working groups for well defined tasks such as the development and/or validation of guidelines and reference methods for indoor human exposure related investigations and measurements or for measures to improve the quality of indoor environments and protecting human health.
• providing a forum to help the exchange centrally of information and collaboration with other national and international organizations active in the aforementioned field (e.g. WHO, NATO/CCMS, U.S. EPA, EEA).
• organizing workshops, symposia, seminars and training courses, activities aimed at helping the transfer of knowledge in this scientific field within the EU Member States and to the Accession Counties.