The health and productivity of employees is a high priority for most companies. Dr Waldemar Wagner, product manager, at ebm-papst neo, explains how to take an intelligent approach to Indoor Air Qualiy (IAQ) with easy-to-retrofit components and a cloud-based platform.
Employers regularly put numerous measures in place, ranging from ergonomic workstations to company sports groups, to improve employee health and productivity. While all of these steps can make difference, one key component is often forgotten and that is air quality.
We can survive weeks without food and days without water, but only a few minutes without air. We breathe in and out up to 15,000 litres of air every day. That is why it is so important that the quality of this air is as high as possible. It is crucial to health, important for our day-to-day productivity and essential for our wellbeing.
As most Australians spend more than 90 per cent of their time indoors (https://www.environment.gov.au/), it quickly becomes clear that good air quality is a critical factor here. In indoor spaces, the surrounding climatic conditions and environmental influences affect the air. But the number of people present, furnishings, technical equipment or building materials used can also directly influence air quality.
If temperatures increase outside due to climate change, the inside can quickly become hot and humid, significantly restricting everyday life. A less obvious but perceptible indicator of poor air quality is the carbon dioxide content. A study by the Harvard School of Public Health shows that people's productivity decreases by 19 per cent when the CO2 content in the air increases by 400 ppm. By comparison: The international standard ISO-13779 assesses the quality of indoor air with a CO2 content of up to 1,000 ppm as medium, from 1,400 ppm as poor. Gases, spores, tiny particles, or hazardous germs or viruses are also invisible health hazards.
Global pandemic
Sars-CoV-2 has made this particularly clear to us. We know that the new coronavirus is widely spread via aerosols. The question of how to make indoor spaces safer in this regard is therefore of great importance. Parameters with which the transmission risk can be estimated have already been identified. Because every person exhales CO2, the CO2 concentration in a room indicates how used up the air is. This means the higher the proportion of CO2 particles, the higher the proportion of air that has been breathed several times.
In turn, this means the higher the CO2 concentration, the higher the risk of infection. The German Environment Agency has therefore suggested "CO2 traffic lights": If sensors register a previously defined CO2 value, the room must be ventilated.
Humidity also plays a crucial role in the spread of the virus. For example, a research team from the University of Missouri has shown that, with high humidity, particles can remain in the air for longer and travel further than in dry air. The catch: From a humidity level of less than 40 per cent, people's mucous membranes suffer and are then more susceptible to illness.
It is good to know these parameters. Many building operators, however, are unable to tell their users how often the air is actually replaced or how clean it is. To be able to check the parameters, they must first be identified and controlled. And this is currently not technically possible in most buildings. The status quo in the management of indoor air quality is to use your gut feeling. Often people then ventilate rooms more than necessary which negates energy efficiency.
Using data
ebm-papst neo, the start-up of the ventilation and drive specialist in Mulfingen, wants to change this by offering the world's first sensor-based building standard for commercial buildings and their interior spaces in the form of RESET. The standard monitors, communicates, and certifies the air quality in buildings. To achieve this, sensors in the fresh air supply and exhaust and in the inside spaces record various air quality parameters: Temperature, air humidity, carbon dioxide, fine dust (PM2.5) and TVOC, i.e., gases emitted by the materials present indoors (see image). To ensure the accuracy of the data recorded, RESET specifies strict requirements for the precision of the sensors and the type of data transmission.
The data is sent to the ebm-papst Building Connect platform via the Gateway connectivity module. This platform is where the data is processed and analysed. It can then be provided to the building operator and also be used to optimize the building control systems. The ebm-papst Building Connect platform therefore plays an active role in monitoring indoor air quality and regulating it in an energy-efficient way. Algorithms learn from user behaviour, building characteristics and environmental conditions, and, with the help of energy-saving fans, help to create an optimized indoor eco-system.
Particle loads
RESET will soon offer an index that can indicate the risk of infection in a room. To do this, it uses air parameters such as the CO2 concentration as well as the actual particle load. Filter units mounted on the ceiling can be networked with the system. They can filter not only pollutants and viruses out of the air, but also provide data about the number of particles via a fine dust sensor. This can be used for the RESET index.
It compares the measured number of particles in the air with the actual air purification rate – in which aerosolized virus particles are eliminated. As a result, building operators do not have to rely on estimated values and more ventilation than they need. They can create clean air in indoor spaces, as energy efficiently as possible.
Plug and play
The possibility of managing building controls with the ebm-papst Building Connect platform has the advantage of an Internet-capable brain to a simple control system. Users can specify optimized times for a time-controlled ventilation system, thereby controlling the air quality in real time.
The great advantage of the ebm-papst Building Connect platform is that it can be implemented quickly and without a great deal of effort. Experts inspect the rooms and define the position of the sensors. Room plans are used to create a digital twin of the building on the Building Connect platform. Once the sensors have been installed, the system is ready for use. It all takes just a few weeks.
This principle is also behind the RESET-certified fan from ebm-papst. This combination product consists of an energy-saving fan with RESET-certified sensor and gateway . The RESET-certified fan supplies fan data such as speed, vibration, noise, air speed, power consumption, and at the same time, the air quality parameters described above. In this regard, the RESET-certified fan is a true plug-and-play solution: Install, plug in – and breathe deeply.