English

Methods of monitoring passive smoking vary in accuracy and expense. Annoyance is easily identified among smokers and non-smokers alike. Sensory irritation does occur, but the threshold is difficult to establish. Infections in children appear to be generally correlated with mother's smoking and by amount of smoking per day. The effect on children's lung function growth has been established, but amount varies. Passive smoking has a blunting effect on response to other irritants and asthmatics are more susceptible than others.

Indoor radon concentrations are approximately lognormally distributed, with the range of concentrations varying from a one in one thousand risk of contracting lung cancer to high one per cent risk. Source strength rather than ventilation rate seems to be the major factor causing the broad distribution in concentrations. There is general agreement that the most important mechanism for radon entry into homes is not diffusion but pressure driven flow of soil gas that carries radon from the soil into the homes.

Summary of conference discussions on formaldehyde, including character- ization, sources, measurement techniques, health effects, mitigation techniques and conclusions: 1. Elevated formaldehyde concentrations, higher than 100 ppb, are measured in many indoor environments. Formaldehyde concentrations relate positively with temperature and decrease with the age of the source. 2. Urea formaldehyde bonded products can be improved to such a degree that indoor levels can be reduced to ambient levels if the materials are properly installed and used. 3.

The report of the investigation into the possibilities for saving energy by closing (large) windows in good time after, for example, the so-called 'airing' of bedrooms, initiated by the Netherlands Ministry of Housing and Environment's Steeri

The session on measured air infiltration rates in residences showed that the situation has changed drastically since the first symposium on air infiltration in 1978. Whereas in 1978 little measured data or pressurization data, or both, exist. This session contained excellent papers that summarised the state of the existing data on air infiltration.

Large, multicelled and naturally ventilated buildings pose many problems for the measurement of overall infiltration rates using tracer gases. In this paper, a simple technique proposed earlier is explored further by reference toa computer model study as well as by field measurements in two in two naturally ventilated office buildings. Results show that using this technique, the overall infiltration rates of large, multicelled and naturally ventilated buildings can be obtained to a good approximation.

Provides the text of the 68 papers presented at the symposium, arranged under the following headings - Plenary session, Advanced developments in ventilation, Control of toxic and explosive contaminants, Advances in tracer gas use, Ventilation for residential and modern office buildings, Advances in local exhaust technology, Ventilation for control of carcin- ogens and biohazards, Ventilation measurement and control, Sources emission rates, Filters, Air recirculation and energy conservation.

Air pollution is not just a phenomenon associated with urbanization and industrialization. It is possible that the principal exposures to several important pollutants occur in rural areas of developing countries where the population relies on biomass fuels for their energy needs. These fuels have large emission factors for particulates, CO and a range of hydrocarbons. Rural studies have found very high BaP concentrations. Effects on health have not been researched, but can be assumed to be similar to urban occupational air pollution effects.

Indoor concentrations of a variety of particulate matter and gaseous compounds often exceed outdoor concentrations. We should examine exposures to air pollutants within the important built environments or perhaps on a personal basis. The development of reliable biological markers is still an area of active research. Instruments passively monitoring NO2 exposures over timeperiods ranging from hours to days have been used in several studies in theU.S.

Contains further papers, reports and conference summaries from the 3rd International Conference on Indoor Air Quality and Climate, 1984, as well as afull list of authors and titles of papers printed in this and the previous volumes.