Indoor Air Quality and its contribution to education
Indoor air quality (IAQ) is an important issue across a wide range of buildings. From offices and conference facilities to hospitals and care homes, the air that we breath can have a significant impact not only on how we feel but also in the consequences for longer term health issues. Headaches, tiredness, eye or throat irritation, coughing and the exacerbation of asthma conditions are all symptoms associated with poor IAQ. Longer term it is associated with stroke, ischaemic heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and lung cancer[1].
In education environments its effects can be particularly acute. The U.S Environment Protection Agency (EPA) has consistently ranked indoor air pollution as one of the top five environmental risks to public health and numerous studies have been conducted in schools, colleges and universities to demonstrate how air pollution can negatively affect students’ cognitive and respiratory health, reducing their learning performance and increasing their susceptibility to diseases in adult life.
Such issues have raised the profile of how a building’s systems can be controlled to help address these problems. The first consideration with building management systems (BMS) is often energy efficiency and the contribution they can make in reducing costs and improving sustainability. However, increasingly - and certainly contributed to by Covid 19 - is a focus on how they can also deliver better health for those that are using them. There are essentially nine foundations to a healthy building: ventilation, air quality, thermal comfort, moisture/humidity, dust/pests, lighting and views, water quality, noise, and safety and security.
Building management systems to control indoor air quality
Focusing on IAQ , studies suggest that 40-60% relative humidity is ideal for indoor human health and reducing virus vitality. With each person delivering approximately 8 litres of air per minute through breathing (children typically half that amount), the released air contains CO2 plus droplets and aerosols. CO2 levels should be kept below a certain level to help provide well being for students and teachers alike. The variation in levels in a typical school are illustrated in a report by DEFRA in which under a heading of ‘CO2 in Schools’ it talks of “…significant variations during the day associated with changes in occupancy of the rooms and changes in air ventilation: typical values are about 1000 ppm in winter and 650 ppm in summer”[2].
These variations are where an effective building management system can help. The level of automation dictates just how much control is available, from basic entry-level systems through which management is based on room demand right through to systems which effectively automate the whole building operation – heating, lighting, air conditioning, cooling, shade control, and door and window technology. These can all be networked to communicate with each other to enable central control through intelligent BMS.
It is important here to recognise the role of sensors. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a term that is heard a lot these days, none more so than in education where the concerns are largely focused on its implications in providing the means for students to effectively cheat by using AI to complete assignments. However, it also has an important role to play in the control of buildings. AI is only as powerful as the data it is given, with the quality of the AI decisions depending directly on the input provided. This is true of room sensors, with technologies now available to deliver high-resolution, real-time contextual data, enabling AI to detect subtle trends, anticipate behaviour and optimise complex systems with surgical precision. It is the difference between reacting and predicting – between automation and true intelligence.
Simplification through traffic light system
However, while such an approach is at one end of the complexity scale, as already stated, much simpler options are available in BMS which can still significantly help to improve air quality. One recent development introduced by Siemens is a range of IAQ room sensors based on a traffic light system to enable issues to be identified at a glance. Many IAQ sensors indicate the levels of CO2 parts per million for a given environment. However, without information regarding what constitutes an ideal level in terms of air quality, this can be effectively meaningless. This has brought the introduction of a simple yet powerful tool to address this challenge: CO2 traffic light sensors, with a green, amber or red light indicating the respective good to bad levels of air quality in real time. Research suggests that keeping CO2 levels below 1,000ppm can increase productivity by between 2-18%. However, it is unreasonable to expect a teacher to have an in-depth understanding or the time to constantly monitor CO2 levels, whereas a simple red light provides an immediate alert that the air quality is poor and that it is time to open a window or improve the air circulation through the building’s BMS. This visual cue empowers building occupants to take control of their environment without needing technical expertise. It also fosters awareness and behavioural change, encouraging proactive ventilation habits that improve IAQ without relying solely on automated systems.
Connecting the dots for MATs
With the shift towards a more holistic approach to managing a building in terms of its active contribution to the well being of its users, so the need for connectivity of the sensors and control devices is becoming ever more important. Solutions are now available which allow daily building management tasks to be undertaken from one place via a cloud-based interface with no additional gateway or software. With the ongoing trend towards adopting Multi-Academy Trusts (MATs) in education, having control not only across a number of buildings but also, increasingly, across different sites is becoming a more regular requirement. Alarm notifications for potential issues, as well as graphics that visualise historical trends, can provide meaningful insights into building performance at any time, supporting the optimisation of building operations.
Intuitive online access can be available via desktop or smartphone, with installation achieved via plug and play, so system integrators, technicians and facility managers do not need engineering skills to set up, configure and operate systems. It is important that such interfaces can support a range of communication protocols to optimise connectivity (wired or wireless) – BACnet, LoRaWan, M-Bus, Modbus and KNX are all protocols used in BMS.
Health and academic benefits
Controlling the environment of buildings through BMS is increasingly becoming the norm rather than the exception. While the advantages this provides in terms of energy efficiency and sustainability continue to be important, the contribution to the health and well being of a building’s occupants is now firmly part of the decision-making process and should not be under estimated. In educational environments, this is particularly pertinent. Alongside the health benefits there are the academic advantages of better IAQ: increased student focus, engagement and test performance; reduced classroom disruption due to illness and absenteeism; and enhanced teacher productivity and quality of teaching. Many of the BMS that are now available are not only suitable for new builds but can also be installed in existing buildings so the benefits can be realised across the education sector.
Ian Ellis, Marketing Manager, Siemens Buildings
[1] World Health Organization (WHO) – ‘Household air pollution’
[2] ‘Indoor Air Quality’ – Air Quality Expert Group, Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA)