office building

A survey of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) controls in California office buildings was carried out to obtain information on the type and distribution of ETS controls in office buildings and to evaluate the effectiveness of various ETS controls. A total of 118 smoking areas in 111 county and city buildings were inspected to collect information on the type of ETS controls. Only 31 % of the smoking areas inspected were physically separated from nonsmoking areas with full floor-to-true-ceiling walls, 25% exhausted air to the outside, and 38% did not recirculate air to non-smoking areas.

This paper characterizes the relationship between occupant activities and indoor air particulate levels in a non-smoking office building. Occupant activities were recorded on video. Particulate concentrations were monitored by three optical particle counters (OPCs) in five size ranges at three heights. Particulate mass concentrations were measured gravimetrically and bioaerosol concentrations were determined by impaction methods. Occupant activities and number concentrations were determined with 1-min resolution over a 1-week period.

A series of bioaerosol measurements have been conducted at two typical offices in Hong Kong for both a 4-day and a weekly period. Both the investigated offices were installed with heating ventilation and air-conditioning (HV AC) systems coupling with air handling units and fan coil units. Measurements were performed starting from early morning by the Anderson N6 impactor.

The results of indoor air quality surveys have showed that it was quite easy to fulfil the requirements of indoor climate standards and recommendations, even in office buildings where the workers experienced sick building symptoms, and complained that the reason for their symptoms was poor indoor air quality (1, 2). Many researchers consider that psychosocial factors may serve as moderators or mediators in the sick building syndrome process, either increasing or decreasing the vulnerability of the individual to environmental exposures (3, 4).

The Equitable Building, which opened on 1January1948, in Portland, Oregon, was the first of a new architectural form. Technically and aesthetically it was radically different from any previous structure. It was a fully air conditioned building, clad with sheer aluminium curtain walling and huge expanses of sea green tinted sealed glass. It was fully electric with heat pumps providing heating and cooling from underground aquifers. The architect was Pietro Belluschi, an Italian immigrant who originally trained as an engineer and the mechanical engineer was J.

The transient performance of displacement ventilation has rarely been studied though many researches have been done on the area.. Due to the importance to the analysis and design of an air conditioning system, the unsteady histories of displacement ventilation of a typical office in Hong Kong is simulated numerically with a validated computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model. Solar heat gain is introduced from the glass wall. Turbulent flow with thermal convection is considered. As a preliminary research, the heat capacity of the walls, occupants and machines is ignored.

The results of three independent studies involving 90 subjects, and using similar procedures and blind exposures have shown that increasing air quality (by decreasing the pollution load or by increasing the ventilation rate, with otherwise constant indoor climate conditions) can improve the performance of simulated office work (text typing, addition and proof-reading). An analysis of the combined data from these studies is presented to establish the relationship between air quality and performance in offices.

Perceived air quality, symptoms, and perception of the environment were studied in a naturally ventilated office building in which a felt carpet was substituted by linoleum on the first floor and by polyolefine floor tiles, known from previous studies to be a low-polluting floor material on the second floor, while the felt carpet remained unchanged on the ground floor. A panel of 36 untrained subjects occupied the offices on each storey for a period of one hour in a balanced design on a day when normal occupants were absent.

Perceived air quality, Sick Building Syndrome (SBS) symptoms and productivity were studied in a normally furnished office space (108 m3) ventilated with an outdoor airflow of 3, 10 or 30 L/s per person, corresponding to an air change rate of 0.6, 2 or 6 h-1. The temperature of 22°C, the relative humidity of 40% and all other environmental parameters remained unchanged. Five groups of six female subjects were each exposed to the three ventilation rates, one group and one ventilation rate at a time. Each exposure lasted 4.6 h and took place in the afternoon.