Consulting-Specifying Engineer - December 2007 - (Page 15) M/E Roundtable CSE : How can organizations such as the Natl. Institute of Health (NIH) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta increase public awareness about the medical problems connected with poor IAQ? STREIFEL: We need to do more environmentally based research. The means and methods are just now in the developmental stage in immunochemistry and the sophistication level has increased over the last five years. BRENNAN: Other than the surgeon general putting a warning label on the outside of buildings that do not pass certain IAQ regulations, there is not a lot that can be done. OUELLETTE: The problem is that these institutions are taking pieces of the problem and overanalyzing specific aspects, but there are no specialists. There is no interdepartmental communication between organizations such as NIH and Natl. Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), and the result is a splintering of both information and power. CSE : Why do you suppose there were no professional engineers or field experts on the Expert Panel 3 (EP-3) committee that was convened to update the guidelines? BRENNAN: First, the EP-3 Committee is a research group composed of doctors put together by the NAEPP to develop a report that provides a general approach to diagnosing asthma. The four goals of the EP-3 focus on the use of objective measures of lung function to assess the severity of asthma, advance environmental control measures, improve patient education and pharmacologic therapy for long-term management of asthma. In regard to your question, it’s the same reason there are no doctors on the ASHRAE 62.1 or Environmental Health committees. Rarely do medical professionals and building people combine forces in order to produce a case study report. Although the entire advisory board for EP-3 is physicians, there are sections of the guidelines that address structural and building design problems. As a research scientist, I feel there should be more committees where doctors and engineers combine their efforts to produce guidelines. STREIFEL: The lack of collaboration between doctors and engineers reflects a misunderstanding of the environment and building science. OUELLETTE: The incorporation of building science into building design is essential. In other words, if you take the best-laid plans and put them into a dysfunctional building, the problems will persist. I constantly am asked “Why is it one day we suffer from one thing and not the other?” You have a house full of holes that is ventilating itself and you do not have a heat ventilator bringing in the heat in one spot, and so what you have is a little bit of air coming from different places. Depending on the weather, wind, temperature, and barometric pressure, the variables inside of the house are going to fluctuate, because you don’t have an absolute thermal boundary. If the complete HVAC equation is not taken into account, then building science and biological science will be lacking. I have been trying to bring doctors and building scientists together for 10 years. I set up programs where I brought in the industrial hygienist. I brought in the American Lung Assn. Health House people. I brought Terry Brennan in as the research scientist. I put a good meeting together, and the doctors wouldn’t show up. I think many physicians fail to realize that there is such a thing as building science, or they do not recognize it as a science. However, there is some progress. NIOSH and other agencies have started learning about the total environmental equation. C S E : What are some long -term structural changes to HVAC systems in office buildings, that will combat poor IAQ? Turnkey cogen solutions Save money with a combined heat and power (CHP) system from Cummins Power Generation Inc. that delivers up to 90% fuel efficiency. Our turnkey energy solutions include design, installation and even management of your power generation system. To see our cogeneration projects around the world, visit www.cumminspower.com/ cogeneration Our energy working for you.TM © 2007 Cummins Power Generation Inc. Consulting-Specifying Engineer • DECEMBER 2007 15 Input #210 at csemag.com/quickResponse http://www.cumminspower.com/cogeneration http://www.cumminspower.com/cogeneration http://www.cumminspower.com/cogeneration http://csemag.com/quickResponse
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