If a proposed European standard on indoor air quality gets the green light, architects and engineers could face the biggest upheaval in design practice since the invention of air conditioning. Dogged by constant controversy, the so-called Fanger standard is now out for a European vote. The Scandinavians say it will work, the UK says not. Who is right? Building Services Journal and the BRE convened a top team of designers and architects to find out.

In most cities, vehicles are the main sources of pollutants. The concentration of pollutants is then known to vary with traffic intensity. Ventilation flows should be adjusted accordingly, which would give improved air quality, especially in dwellings.

The indoor-outdoor comparison of volatile organic compounds was made in 52 private homes in the City of Munich, Germany. The VOC concentrations were measured by trapping with activated charcoal tubes and analyzed by capillary GC. The infiltrated NO, was monitored in the indoor air. It can be concluded that the benzene concentration in the indoor air is controlled by the outdoor concentration for approximatively 30 % of the investigated cases.                

Experiments were performed using small-scale climate chambers, including the new Chamber for Laboratory Investigations of Materials Pollution and Air Quality (CLIMPAQ), to gain knowledge about the influence of ventilation rate per plane specimen area (specific ventilation rate) on emission rates. Emissions from pieces of linoleum, waterborne acrylic paint, nylon carpet, and sealant were quantified at different specific ventilation rates.

Currently one of the most rapidly growing areas receiving attention is energy efficiency in buildings. In this context naturally ventilated buildings are an inevitable design solution. This paper reports preliminary observations of a project aimed at investigating pollution levels within these type of buildings. Due to the difficulty of predicting and controlling the amount of suspended particles entering naturally ventilated buildings an understanding of the type of pollutants, their size and their composition is necessary.

With environmental issues (such as high energy costs for air-conditioning and related C02 emissions and global warming) in mind, designers are increasingly considering natural ventilation as the primary design option. Naturally ventilated office buildings can typically consume less than half the delivered energy consumed in air-conditioned buildings representing cost-effective energy savings of the order of 20-30%.