Healthy Home InnovationLet's Make Your House Healthy

ASHRAE Guideline Addresses Interactions Affecting Indoor Environmental Quality

ATLANTA – A proposed guideline, currently out for public comment, would provide guidance on achieving good indoor environments by considering the interactions of air quality and thermal conditions as well as lighting and acoustics.

ASHRAE Guideline 10P, Interactions Affecting the Achievement of Acceptable Indoor Environments, calls attention to many interactions that designers might not have previously recognized or understood. The guideline opened for public comment on April 9 and remains open until May 24.

“The guideline summarizes what research and experience have taught us about the complex interplay of the wide range of factors that determine occupants’ reactions to the buildings they inhabit,” Hal Levin, chair of the committee writing the guideline, said.

Levin explains that the guideline is intended to help users understand and use existing documents that deal with indoor environments, including the ASHRAE standards related to ventilation and indoor air quality and thermal conditions with a more complete understanding of the impacts of the indoor environmental on occupants. “It can provide assistance to building design professionals and building operators by making them aware of the major interactions that have the potential to impact the indoor environment,” he said. “We believe the guideline will help draw attention to the narrowly-defined scopes of the widely-used standards and the significance of interactive effects in determining the acceptability of an indoor environment.”

The draft of Guideline 10P is available for comment only during its public review period. To read the guideline or to comment, visit www.ashrae.org/publicreviews.

For further information contact: Jodi Scott, Public Relations, 678-539-1140, jscott(at)ashrae.org

RBc: As stated in the forward, “This guideline is intended to help people understand and use all of the documents that deal with indoor environments, such as ASHRAE Standard 62.1, Standard 62.2, Standard 55 and the ASHRAE Indoor Air Quality Guide, as a whole rather than separately. The guideline focuses on thermal conditions, indoor air quality (IAQ), and the interactions between these environmental conditions as they affect the acceptability of the indoor environment. In addition, but to a lesser extent, it also addresses mechanical energy (including noise and vibration) and electromagnetic radiation (including environmental lighting, ultraviolet and infrared radiation) as additional sources of interactions affecting the acceptability of the indoor environment as well as limitations that exist in the ability to achieve acceptability.”

We encourage readers to visit the ASHRAE site to review and comment on this document.

For a back ground study we suggest reading these pages. http://www.healthyheating.com/Defintion_of_indoor_environmental_quality.htm
http://www.healthyheating.com/Thermal_Comfort_Working_Copy/IAQ_ICQ_IEQ.htm http://www.healthyheating.com/Human_Factors/Human_Factors.htm
http://www.healthyheating.com/Definitions/facts_about_skin.htm http://www.healthyheating.com/Thermal_Comfort_Working_Copy/HH_physiology_intro.htm

Also view our ASHRAE lecture on The Human Factors in HVAC Systems