Air quality

A healthy indoor environment inside the office

How do CO2, outdoor air, and indoor air affect the health, productivity, and well-being of employees?


'Getting some fresh air', why do we do that outside?

The statement 'I'm going to get some fresh air' is familiar to everyone. Yet there is an assumption in the statement: we have to go outside to get fresh air. But how come?

Bad air in the workplace

Who doesn't recognize that after a long day of work in the office you start to get a headache? Or nausea? These are signals of a bad indoor environment.

Getting drowsy is often the reason to get some fresh air. It's a fact that going for a walk outside during lunchtime is a great pick-me-up. Although the outside air is not optimal, it can be said that it is healthier than indoors. Indoor air can be 2 to 5 times more polluted [1]. Yeap, really!

Ventilation systems must supply buildings with fresh air and remove dirty air. The more people, the higher the air pollution. The type of activities that take place in space is also important, because working harder, including mentally, results in more indoor air pollution.

We always look at outside air pollution, but the indoor air can be 2 to 5 times more polluted.

CO2 and Productivity

Contrary to common belief CO2 is probably not the blame. Researchers think the gases humans produce other than CO2 are the culprit [2]. CO2 just happens to correlate very well with those. The health effects of bad indoor air include dizziness, nausea, and drowsiness. When CO2 in the indoor space rises above 800 parts per million (ppm), it has direct consequences on cognitive ability [3]. Therefore, the Dutch Working Act (ARBO) requires buildings to have a minimum ventilation rate that approximately corresponds to 1200 ppm.

Researchers at Harvard University showed that cognitive ability doubles as soon as CO2 concentrations dropped from about 1000 to 500 ppm, in combination with a low amount of volatile organic compounds and good ventilation[5]. A low level of pollution in the indoor air ensures that you can think twice as well. Therefore, the increase in cognitive ability in healthy buildings resulted in a productivity gain of €6000 per employee per year[6].

The increase in cognitive ability in healthy buildings resulted in a productivity gain of €6000 per employee per year. 

It is therefore important that the supply of fresh air in a building is continuously adapted to the number of users and the nature of the activities that take place in a room. A ventilation system does not have to work overtime during the night (energy efficiency), but when many people are present, a high CO2 concentration is not desirable.

Optimal indoor air quality requires a system that continuously measures and anticipates. That is, if the amount of CO2 rises, the ventilation system must automatically supply more fresh air or an alarm must go off indicating that the user switches on the ventilation system or opens a window.

The office is taking a different meaning, with health becoming a central component. By starting to measure and analyze the air quality levels in your office spaces, you gain insight into how healthy the space you're offering to your employees is and how the productivity of yourself and your employees can be improved.

Are you curious to know more about the air quality level at your building? Do a Clairify quick scan and get useful insights into the CO2 in your building.

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT YOUR BUILDING

 


 

Sources

  1. Wallace LA. The Total Exposure Assessment Methodology (TEAM) Study: An Analysis of Exposures, Sources, and Risks Associated with Four Volatile Organic Chemicals [Internet]. Vol. 8, Journal of the American College of Toxicology. 1989. p. 883–95. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.3109/10915818909018049
  2. Zhang, Xiaojing/Asit Mishra/Pawel Wargocki (2022): Effects from Exposures to Human Bioeffluents and Carbon Dioxide, in: Handbook of Indoor Air Quality, Springer Singapore, pp. 1–12. Available from: http://10.1007/978-981-10-5155-5_63-1.
  3. Pernot, C.E.E., Koren, L.G.H., Dongen, J.E.F. van, Bronswijk, J.E.M.H. van. Relatie EPC-niveau en gezondheidsrisico’s als onderdeel van het kwaliteitsniveau van gebouwen [Internet]. TNO Bouw; 2003 [cited 2020 May 7]. Available from: https://www.narcis.nl/publication/RecordID/oai:tudelft.nl:uuid:9bac520a-e174-4d1c-9e8d-e22a5d2e883b
  4. Karnauskas K, Miller S, Schapiro A. Fossil fuel combustion is driving indoor CO2 toward levels harmful to human cognition [Internet]. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.31223/osf.io/b8umq
  5. Allen JG, MacNaughton P, Satish U, Santanam S, Vallarino J, Spengler JD. Associations of Cognitive Function Scores with Carbon Dioxide, Ventilation, and Volatile Organic Compound Exposures in Office Workers: A Controlled Exposure Study of Green and Conventional Office Environments. Environ Health Perspect. 2016 Jun;124(6):805–12. Available from: https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/full/10.1289/ehp.1510037
  6. MacNaughton P, Pegues J, Satish U, Santanam S, Spengler J, Allen J. Economic, Environmental and Health Implications of Enhanced Ventilation in Office Buildings. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2015 Nov 18;12(11):14709–22. Available from: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/12/11/14709/htm
  7. Landrigan PJ, Fuller R, Acosta NJR, Adeyi O, Arnold R, Basu NN, et al. The Lancet Commission on pollution and health. Lancet. 2018 Feb 3;391(10119):462–512. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29056410
  8. Brockmeyer S, D’Angiulli A. How air pollution alters brain development: the role of neuroinflammation [Internet]. Vol. 7, Translational Neuroscience. 2016. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/tnsci-2016-0005
  9. Luchtkwaliteit | Compendium voor de Leefomgeving [Internet]. [cited 2020 May 6]. Available from: https://www.clo.nl/onderwerpen/Luchtkwaliteit

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