The pandemic revealed that Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) matters. Before COVID-19, terms like ‘ventilation effectiveness’, ‘ultraviolet’, ‘ASHRAE 62’ were known only to HVAC engineers; today, there is general awareness of the issues that underpin them. Awareness isn’t enough, though.

Climate Control Middle East magazine has already published many articles regarding the basics of IAQ best practices and the basic need to open the windows and dampers, clean the air, and to tune up our HVAC and BMS systems.

However, if we want to futureproof our buildings from the next pandemic, we need to implement ongoing monitoring of IAQ to ensure we maintain our building health. In 2020, I proposed what I then called ‘building tracing’, in response to the government-run ‘contact tracing’ programme. My point was that specific buildings with poor IAQ could also qualify as super-spreaders of the virus. Now that we are beyond the acute phase of the pandemic, we need to incorporate building tracing into our standard practice through continuous IAQ monitoring.

Jeremy McDonald

Building tracing as a concept The metrics for good IAQ are straightforward: Ensure adequate ventilation per well-established building codes, ensure good filtration and ensure CO2 concentrations are not rising quickly with occupancy. Add a properly installed and commissioned air-cleaning device, and the building space is now above code and minimising the ability of viruses to propagate. However, for many buildings, the existing IAQ is sub-optimal at best or non-existent in too many cases.

Lack of ventilation, sub-optimal construction or deferred maintenance are the most common reasons for poor IAQ, but since air is invisible, most people have no idea when they are walking into a space with good or poor IAQ.

With building tracing – that is, continuous monitoring – owners would be required to report the IAQ of the space, which would inform the occupant of the IAQ conditions before they enter. By providing information in a transparent manner, the spaces with sub-optimal IAQ would be quickly identified, which would force changes to improve the IAQ. Moving forward, when issues occur, building management would have the tools necessary to identify the problem in a timely manner, thus allowing the opportunity to fix the problem and protect the building occupants. With the Internet of Things, we have well-established and cost-effective infrastructure that can provide real-time feedback, data tracking, and reporting to anyone with an IT connection.

In addition to help mitigate viral spread, building monitoring systems can help mitigate issues with mould, allergies and other antagonists to human health. When used correctly, we can reduce our carbon footprint by allowing HVAC systems to reduce the provision of ventilated air, which is heated and cooled, when conditions permit.

The process has started 

Already, there are green shoots of continuous building monitoring sprouting up in various locales. Boston Public Schools, in Massachusetts, for example, recently installed IAQ sensors in all classrooms and areas of high concern – that is, nurse’s office, main office, etc.

The sensors report data on a real-time basis, including:

• Carbon dioxide
• Carbon monoxide
• Airborne particulates
• Temperature
• Relative Humidity

The stakeholder in Boston can go to a readily available platform and drill down to the data of interest. In my view, here are the fundamentals of what a data platform should entail:

• Software shall be open-dashboard format and easily accessible – that is, mobile app.
• Data should be reportable to a central server but also locally stored on a data logger.
• Drill-down capabilities. Dashboard shall start at district level, then buildings, then spaces.
• Data should be easily downloadable. ASCI II and Excel format are the standards. This easy download capability empowers the user to evaluate data as they see fit, which will improve buy-in from stakeholders.
• Alarm capability. For critical variables, such as rate of change for CO or CO2 threshold, an alarm should be sent to facility operation personnel. This gives the O&M personnel an opportunity to address the issue, which again, gives stakeholders confidence, since it is clear someone is actively watching the IAQ performance.
• Aggregate reporting. Real-time reporting, monthly and annual reporting are all critical for stakeholders to digest information for the operation. Based on comparison to well-defined metrics, decision makers can quickly determine if they are on track for IAQ performance.
• For spaces that habitually perform poorly, the root cause needs to be traced and corrected.

Building tracing best practices

When parents in a K-12 environment, like the Boston School District, have access to open and transparent data for their loved ones, effective change will be realised. But even there, I have suggestions for improvement. Above is a listing of key variables and the reason for their importance. Variables highlighted in Green are part of the BSD dashboard, while those in red I recommend for future dashboards.

Building Tracing: A path forward

We already have the technology and the knowledge to make continuous building monitoring a reality. What we need is the political will to make this a reality. Here in the United States, I speculate that if put to the general public, an overwhelming majority of people would support this initiative.

So, what is stopping us? In my conversations with elected and public health officials, two issues consistently come up: The first is the perceived cost and the other is the fear of the unknown. Based on my experience, a cost of USD 2-4/square foot is reasonable for a continuous building monitoring system. On the other hand, what is the cost of another pandemic? Certainly, we as a society cannot afford the health effects and economic shutdown we experienced in 2020. Viewed in this context, USD2-4/square foot seems like a reasonable investment.

The second issue is the fear of the unknown. In my conversations with regulators and government officials, it is well known that several of our buildings have sub-standard IAQ, with many not meeting local building code. To be candid, knowing there is a problem but looking the other way is irresponsible. Again, if we know that IAQ was a major vector in the spread of COVID-19, looking the other way on sub-standard IAQ is irresponsible, and our public deserves better.

Government, this is a call to action to be courageous. I am sure the Boston School District thought about the risk of being transparent about their IAQ. However, if you are confident in your systems, people and ability to solve problems, then there is nothing to be afraid of.

Jeremy McDonald is a principal of Guth DeConzo Consulting Engineers, in New York. Before the pandemic, he was an adjunct professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Recently, he was the technical consultant to the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority in development of an IAQ guideline for Higher Education in NY: “Covid-19 Response Guide, State University of New York”. He may be reached at jmcdonald@guthdeconzo.com.