This study estimated the health, energy and economic benefits of an economizer ventilationcontrol system that increases outside air supply during mild weather to save energy. A modelof the influence of ventilation rate on airborne transmission of respiratory illnesses was usedto extend the limited data relating ventilation rate with illness and sick leave. An energysimulation model calculated ventilation rates and energy use versus time for an office buildingin Washington, D.C., with fixed minimum outdoor air supply rates, with and without aneconomizer.

The presence of high levels of urban pollution imposes at the international level the need tothink again about the type of ventilation systems in residential buildings. This has to be donein order to provide a better IAQ level. Natural ventilation cannot guarantee either the correctchange of air inside the buildings or a good IAQ level, as there is no possibility of checkingthe supply and extraction airflow rates in any thermo-hygrometric condition.

Until recently, the air quality did not play a major role in the planning of buildings. Air qualitywas simply understood to be synonymous with pollution-free and safe air. This approach,however, omitted consideration of how to achieve the well-being of the occupants. Asresearch has shown, elimination of pollutants is far from being sufficient and does notsignificantly reduce the dissatisfaction rate of building occupants. More recently, research hasaddressed the occupants perception of indoor air with the goal of increasing their satisfactionrate.

Evaluation of emissions from building products is mainly focused on comparison betweenexposition concentrations of identified individual organic compounds and health criteria. Noadequate integrated criterion is available for interaction and mixture effects. Besides,everyone performs daily evaluation of perceived air quality. Human beings through theirsenses, for example, olfaction and chemesthesis, are able to achieve a synthetic response to aglobal mixture of compounds.

Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) in workplace and residential environments has been a concern ofpeople. Recently, Ministry of Environment in Korea has recognized the potential risk on thehealth effects related to indoor air pollution at home. Therefore, the purpose of this study wasto measure the indoor air pollutants of IAQ at different homes and investigate the perceptionof IAQ recognition at home through a questionnaire survey in Seoul.We estimated the IAQ of six selected homes based on site region and housing type.

A laboratory study has been carried out to investigate the exposure response relationshipsbetween perceived air quality (PAQ) and concentration of pollutants. The objective was todevelop an interaction model for odour intensity, which allows predicting the perception of acombination of odours on base of the data for the single pollution sources. In the experiments10-12 persons assessed the PAQ in decipolB directly. Three different materials served aspollution sources.

This paper is an overview of literature that investigates the effects of general environmentalquality, indoor air pollution, ventilation rates, thermal comfort, temperature control andnumber of persons per workspace on productivity and sickness absenteeism in offices. Thereview includes both self-reported effects and objective measurements of productivity andabsenteeism and both laboratory studies and field investigations. It turns out that a goodgeneral environmental quality increases productivity by 10-15% and decreases sicknessabsenteeism by 2.5 percentpoint.

The aim of the study was to investigate the effects of elevated summer indoor temperatures onperceived comfort, symptoms and subjectively assessed productivity in an office building.The measurements during spring 2002 showed that indoor environment was at the normalFinnish office building level. The mean room temperature during the 2-week measurementperiod was 22C. An indoor air questionnaire (MM-40-FIN) including additional questionsabout work efficiency was presented to the employees during the measurements. Theperceived indoor environment was at the normal Finnish office level.

This paper is a review of occupant responses to localized (floor and desk mounted) airdistribution systems. These systems offer personal control, and can produce good ambientconditions, but few studies have examined their effects on actual occupants. A review ofeleven studies suggested these systems can lead to favourable occupant responses, which insome cases exceed those encountered using traditional mixing systems. However, most of thestudies included methodological limitations, which reduce the strength of conclusions that canbe drawn.

Many workers in an office building complained about IAQ. No moisture damage was foundin the offices, which were, however, painted and carpeting was changed. Ventilation ductswere cleaned and the supply and exhaust air vents were installed in every room. Shortly afterthe repair the workers developed symptoms. A thorough survey of IAQ including microbesand particles and volatile organic compounds was conducted twice after the repair. Betweensurveys the rooms were cleaned for 2 months twice a week with more effective practices thanbefore.