Paris, France, 11 February 2018: Indoor air quality is a field where modelling and numerical simulations could be extremely useful. Jacques Moussafir, President and CEO of Aria Technologies, a French company specialising in air modelling and assessment of the atmospheric environment, is reluctant to “speak for his chapel”, yet maintained that he is aware of the value that the technology has towards effective design of the built-environment – even in preparing for unfortunate situations. Typically, Moussafir said, air modelling is applied to ensure proper ventilation and indoor air quality. Their services, he said, are particularly ideal for department stores, “which are famous in France and attract as many people as the Louvre”. However, Moussafir said, there is “a darker side to what they do”, pertaining to their value in the field of risk assessment.

“Department stores [are] crowded,” Moussafir said, “so there is kind of this convergence between the studies we do for indoor air quality and the studies we do for emergency response.” Speaking of worst-case scenarios, Moussafir said there is a whole process in which to properly organise a quick evacuation system and how to release the proper fresh air in case of toxic gas attacks.

“In our field of activity,” Moussfir said, “for ordinary indoor air quality, the technology has a lot in common with [emergency] response, where we have to think of what people do in scenarios in department stores or places such as the Paris Metro. So, a lot of technology has been developed with French emergency response entities, so we do not only work on [tracking] conventional pollutants.”