The more I learn, the more I learn that I don't know. I've been steeping my self in building science for the past 15 years and instead of getting smarter, I feel like I'm just realizing my ever growing ignorance.
I appreciate very much the discussion with Dr. Siegel and his knowledge in the IAQ arena and building performance. We have a design consulting start up business that is being driven be these understandings. High Efficient/performance building envelopes (passive solar design and alternative construction materials, ICF and SIP) , more thoughtful design and installation of HVAC (paying strict attention to the "V") as Dr. Siegel mentioned and powered by alternative, renewable and sustainable power sources ( solar, heat exchange, etc.) Recommend the book "Healthy Buildings: New indoor Spaces Drive Performance and Productivity" which was researched around the commercial, institutional and office/work space but translates totally to the residential built space.
Since humidity control is one of the big components of IAQ, I'm interested in more discussion around the "water" / humidifier conversation on what are best practices in cold climates that require adding humidity to the space .
As an HVAC tech and owner, my goal is to merge science and engineering and technicians trade together as they are often at odds. This conversation was amazing. Thank you
Well just changed my air filter will be buying a merv 13 in the future and changing more often. Great information here. Think I need to supply my humidifier with our R.O. system too. The convective currents in a home are amazing.
We need to separate filtration from air conditioning. Tract builders in Phoenix are very price sensitive. Undersized returns, stamped return grills, and 1" "Allergen Filters" send the static pressure on the HVAC systems through the roof. The from mid October though the beginning of April the unit hardly runs at all providing no filtration.
Corbett- great interview. I thought I had all of the talking points down when it comes to filtration, however, I learned a thing or 2 from this interview.
This is great content as we are planning out the design of our last home to be built to our specifications. Ventilation is my number one item of importance in the overall design. I have always been critical of indoor air quality (having been a career submariner) of the homes we lived in, it was always difficult to overcome the design and builder issues that make retrofitting improvements virtually impossible. Thanks for sharing this information!!
Thanks Tom! If you need any consulting for these things on your build, I’d be happy to help- but I bet a submariner has everything under control. buildingperformanceworkshop.com/video-consulting
@@HomePerformance Great, that is good to know. I will keep that in mind I am sure I don't know everything on how to scale this for the house we want. As we get further in the draft plan I will reach out. Thanks!
I've been wanting to change my filter slot from a 1" to a 4" or a bag style. I was quoted $1600.00-$2000.00 to make the retrofit! Guess I'm going to learn how to do sheet metal.
You have to be careful. If your airflow is not great right now you might make it worse. 4inch pleated filter has a higher pressure drop than 1inch filter. 4 inch can have about .25 or.3 pressure drop Opposed to .1w.c.
Pressure drop is within an acceptable range. It is hard to find data on filters to see what pressure drop to expect. I want to be able to drop in a MERV 13 or 14 without worrying about it. Manufacturers should list a CFM rating on their filters.
Corbett, What an insightful interview. Thank you for bringing on Dr. Siegel he is a wealth of information. This Podcast has really started to generate the questions for me. If I could encourage you to provide some jump starters on the following: What do you recommend to use to monitor or test air quality? Both indoor & outdoor. What specifically should I be looking to monitor? What is critical vs what is nice. Indoor vs Outdoor - Are they monitoring the same thing? How do I know when one makes more sense then the other. i.e. do I open the window or is it better to leave it closed. In particular this is tricky if monitoring different things. Does running my HVAC on a circulating cycle make a difference vs just leaving it set to AUTO? Or is that a seasonal question as it runs at different rates. (Excluding having any other ventilating system.) I am just getting started, but this seems like a good baseline. I did do some preliminary research, but did not find much and what little I found seemed weak in terms of validating. I appreciate your time and look forward to your valuable insights. If you have a preferred forum for these type of questions, please let me know. Thanks again.
Not sure if you ever got your answers but as to the fan being set to on vs auto it depends on the season for your setup. In summer while running cooling it needs to be on auto, and the reason is while running your evaporator coil collects and slowly drains away water that it has just removed from the air(humidity) but after the ac shuts off that coil stays wet for quite a while so what happens is that water, if air continues to flow over it, re evaporates back into the air as water vapor(humidity) 💧 and you'll never get your space comfortable not to mention the health risks. The fan on setting is really only for shoulder seasons where you don't need heating or cooling. If you run fan on constant during heating you would feel more cool draft which many people don't want due to circulating room temp air vs hot or warm air like when furnace or heatpump is running. For opening windows, that's really an hour by hour decision as the weather can change drastically from morning to night or even overnight. Watch your weather every day,get your local weather app on your phone as well. Without getting into talking about dewpoint I'd say if the temp outside is a temp you'd be comfortable and the humidity is below 60rh open the house up.
Great interview. For residential homeowners who are interested in monitoring the air quality inside the home, what systems work well? Assuming we start using better filtration, changing the filter more frequently, and adding a gasket around the filter to prevent bypass, what can we do to monitor the air quality? What does your experience show?
I really like the Airthings line of monitors, along with Broan’s new Overture system. Some people also like HAVEN, which is a one-point measurement in the return duct.
To the customer that doesn't know. My elevator pitch is 'your AC just makes the air cold and hot, it doesn't clean the air, and 1 thing further, what grows in cold, dark, and wet areas? (They know the answer is mold of course) Thats what is going on in your system without any IAQ solutions.' That is a quick eye opener to start the IAQ conversation I've found.
I also feel strongly about a ducted system, also because I want the air filtered. I also don't want a thousand different things to maintain in every room, like you get with the ductless units.
You guys are too smart to be legal in this country. If it looks pretty enough and is cheep enough, it must be a Great American Home. Thanks for some amazing information!
99.99% of residential HVAC companies have Zero clue how to design a UV light system. Even the owner of the company I work for has no experience in designing a system that uses UV or Photovoltaic light. It's not worth the gamble, stick to a fan and a filter.
I saw a discussion about the high filtration air filters and the results indicated that unless your system is made for a high quality filter, you are reducing the ability of the HVAC to work properly. (It can't move the air through the system. Will lead to poor heating or cooling of the structure)
You can simply upsize the filter to increase the surface area, which lowers the static pressure stress on the blower. You can put any high quality on any quality of system, provided it’s big enough.
Of course- that’s the same dumb argument technique as when they say a murderer will do the same job with a baseball bat if we take away his AR-15. It’s just meant to shut down the discussion.
He never mentioned using UV lights as a way of keeping things from growing on the inside surfaces of an air handler. Therefore keeping them from being released into the conditioned space. What do you think his opinion would be on that aspect?
I’ll ask him next time BUT I have several other scientists telling me that a HIGH QUALITY UV-C cleaned snd maintained at the coil is a good idea without many side effects.
@@HomePerformance Can you share the info? I’d like to potentially attend if possible.. We are preparing for a realm of building that we have very little resources locally..
Sounds good! Just search Builders Show 2022 and AHR Expo 2022 (Jan/Feb in Orlando and Vegas) and the National Home Performance Conference (Nashville in April)
Sounds like water filtration is even more important than just drinking if you have a humidifier. I have never seen this talked about with whole home units. I will have to look at the cost of using distilled water with my large standing unit.
After years of being ill when my over sized furnace ran, I opened up the drywall ceiling to find old, leaky ductwork that was falling apart, had been tampered or modified and large 3" gapping holes in the return duct with 40 yrs of construction filthy and rockwool insulation covering them. Nothing is more dangerous than 40+ yr old old leaky, poorly designed ductwork, returns using ceiling and wall cavities and an over-sized furnace. All the filtration in the world will not solve this issue. Quotes to replace system range and add high end filter range from $30K-$47K. It is a modest 2600 sq ft home. There is a lot to be said for ductless.
One takeaway from this for me is that I'd like to improve air flow in my 4-Bedroom house, and have it operate year round. Question: Sorry to be a bit OT, but I've watched many videos on this channel and am trying to figure out what air flow rate you designed your duct system for. More specifically what HVAC appliances stay on 24/7 (and flow rates) and which ones operate intermittantly. I think I've seen where your ERV has separate duct work. Would you mind sharing a schematic of the crawl space layout to show how the appliances interact overall? thank you.
Hey Bob- thanks for your enthusiasm for this channel and topic! I may do a video on this down the line, but HEPA (240 cfm) and heat pump (~500 cfm) stay on 24/7, with heat pump bumping up to 900 when conditioning, and dehum adding ~250 cfm when drying. Add to this the separate ERV system which pumps ~130 in/out 24/7. That's for 2200 sq ft, 30k cu ft.
@@HomePerformance Thank you for the response. Am I correct that your duct work is designed for full flow (@~1490 cfm)? How does the duct work perform at the lower flow of 740 cfm? IOW: What design compromises did you make in the duct work to deliver adequate flow at two (or three) different rates?
Credit to Hank Rutkowski There are scores of things to worry about when designing and installing a comfort system. Low velocity through a duct airway is not one of them.
@@dc1bamf Yeah, that's good to know. I was hypothesising that at lower static pressure (i.e. lower flow), there could be an unbalanced flow in the duct branches resulting in some rooms getting better flow than others. But, I suppose that couldn't happen because an imbalanced system would be evident at all flow rates. Thanks!
Well every home is different, but helping people design complex HVAC systems is what I do a lot of lately. Feel free to book a session, James. buildingperformanceworkshop.com/video-consulting
The equation basically goes, the time we're exposed to something, and the amount of that something, minus the amount our body is able to filter/dilute/render inert, is the time it takes for whatever harmful material to present its bill. Radiation, for example. There's baseline, the background radiation we count as not being very hazardous within our expected lifetimes because it's unavoidable, 24/7 and it's just a fundamental bit of physics we're stuck with. And it hasn't managed to wipe us out yet. Move beyond baseline, even a little bit, and expose yourself to it for years. You may not notice tomorrow, or even 20 years from now, but the whole time it's been degrading your body until finally, someday, the bill comes due. And now you are noticeably, irreparably damaged. Get exposed to it a lot and once and then you're dead in days, hours, immediately. Time to exposure, amount you're exposed. We're educated in the dangers of radiation. Whether we are educated or not, doesn't matter. Physics doesn't care about what you do or don't know, it's going to keep doing it's thing regardless. Same thing with all of these substances coming from so many various materials in our homes. We can ventilate to try and get rid of it, but who says what you're pulling in isn't what your neighbor is also trying to ventilate away? Or all the car exhaust from the busy street you live on? We can filter, but unless you know the source of contamination, and wrap that around a fully enclosed bubble of filtration, you're still getting exposed to it. You just hope it'll now be low enough to not affect you within your expected lifetime. I don't think IAQ's best destiny is to be improved first by ventilation and filtration. In the same way your cough isn't improved by a cough drop. We're doing our best to treat the symptoms, not cure the disease. I think when it comes to housing, we need a severe shift in focus from square footage and magazine indoor finishes at Walmart costs, to building somewhat (not even drastically smaller; $150/sq ft adds up real fast even cutting just a couple hundred square feet) smaller homes with materials that are as close to their original state as possible. Even natural materials produce hazardous materials. Granite countertops, wood, stone, metals, nothing is free from entropy, and those shifting states that degrade the material composition of all things aren't putting out things that are great for our health. But that is literally the baseline, that is the lowest hanging fruit, and that's what we should be trying our best to build with unless we structurally or logistically can't. I will happily cut 200-300+ square feet off my house if it means real wood floors versus luxury vinyl planks, granite versus laminate countertops, tile showers versus plastic enclosures, metal roof versus asphalt. And THEN you ventilate and filter out the cat hair and whatever's left.
Deep thought, @Nerdineering- and you didn’t even step foot into how we should all be cleaning our homes better, not wallowing like a bunch of filthy animals ;)
@Home Performance I'm staring at this field of carpeting pervading my apartment and weeping. Probably from all the cat hair that's already back in it again.
So merciless HVAC myth busting was a bit misleading. When I tell my commercial customers what it would take to deliver them clean fresh air through or along side their existing HVAC system they are usually pretty happy to drop a few grand to put a plug in HEPA scrubber every couple hundred square feet instead. It might not be perfect but it might be the best anyone can feasibly do I f the building wasn’t built with human health placed above cost to build, cost to operate (and even efficiency and comfort).
The more I learn, the more I learn that I don't know. I've been steeping my self in building science for the past 15 years and instead of getting smarter, I feel like I'm just realizing my ever growing ignorance.
Definitely a good one! As an HVAC residential tech this is such a complicated subject. There is so much to know.
Thanks Matt!
I appreciate very much the discussion with Dr. Siegel and his knowledge in the IAQ arena and building performance. We have a design consulting start up business that is being driven be these understandings. High Efficient/performance building envelopes (passive solar design and alternative construction materials, ICF and SIP) , more thoughtful design and installation of HVAC (paying strict attention to the "V") as Dr. Siegel mentioned and powered by alternative, renewable and sustainable power sources ( solar, heat exchange, etc.) Recommend the book "Healthy Buildings: New indoor Spaces Drive Performance and Productivity" which was researched around the commercial, institutional and office/work space but translates totally to the residential built space.
Since humidity control is one of the big components of IAQ, I'm interested in more discussion around the "water" / humidifier conversation on what are best practices in cold climates that require adding humidity to the space .
I’ll put it on the list, Housh!
I'd like to hear more on humidification as well.
As an HVAC tech and owner, my goal is to merge science and engineering and technicians trade together as they are often at odds. This conversation was amazing. Thank you
Thanks for sharing all the information here on the channel! I know I’m gonna learn something new whenever I visit this page! Thankyou all ✊🏾
Thanks V! You know where to find us.
Thank you so much for this Corbett!
My pleasure, Tersh- all we can do is keep chipping away at the mountain, right?
I can't find any Merv13A filters to buy. Help. None of them have the A designation.
Learned so much. A typical HVAC tech is not qualified to make IAQ improvements other than upgrading filtration.
But an HVAC tech can do so much for the indoors by just doing heating, cooling, drying, filtering and ventilating well!
Well just changed my air filter will be buying a merv 13 in the future and changing more often. Great information here. Think I need to supply my humidifier with our R.O.
system too. The convective currents in a home are amazing.
👌🏽👌🏽
We need to separate filtration from air conditioning. Tract builders in Phoenix are very price sensitive. Undersized returns, stamped return grills, and 1" "Allergen Filters" send the static pressure on the HVAC systems through the roof. The from mid October though the beginning of April the unit hardly runs at all providing no filtration.
I noticed quite a bit of dirt on the fan blades of my ventilation system. The filter was not sealing very well. Something to be carefull with.
Right on buddy
Corbett- great interview. I thought I had all of the talking points down when it comes to filtration, however, I learned a thing or 2 from this interview.
Thanks for following, Matt!
This is great content as we are planning out the design of our last home to be built to our specifications. Ventilation is my number one item of importance in the overall design. I have always been critical of indoor air quality (having been a career submariner) of the homes we lived in, it was always difficult to overcome the design and builder issues that make retrofitting improvements virtually impossible. Thanks for sharing this information!!
Thanks Tom! If you need any consulting for these things on your build, I’d be happy to help- but I bet a submariner has everything under control.
buildingperformanceworkshop.com/video-consulting
@@HomePerformance Great, that is good to know. I will keep that in mind I am sure I don't know everything on how to scale this for the house we want. As we get further in the draft plan I will reach out. Thanks!
I've been wanting to change my filter slot from a 1" to a 4" or a bag style. I was quoted $1600.00-$2000.00 to make the retrofit!
Guess I'm going to learn how to do sheet metal.
It’s a helpful skill!
For half that price and a few hours on UA-cam you can buy a prefabricated one and the tools you’ll need to do it.
You have to be careful. If your airflow is not great right now you might make it worse. 4inch pleated filter has a higher pressure drop than 1inch filter. 4 inch can have about .25 or.3 pressure drop
Opposed to .1w.c.
Yes, testing is the only way to go before doing anything to anything.
Pressure drop is within an acceptable range. It is hard to find data on filters to see what pressure drop to expect. I want to be able to drop in a MERV 13 or 14 without worrying about it. Manufacturers should list a CFM rating on their filters.
Great stuff as always eye opener on a few topics
Thanks Bill
Ironic that YT interjected a Febreze ad during this video! lol. Great info!
Corbett,
What an insightful interview. Thank you for bringing on Dr. Siegel he is a wealth of information. This Podcast has really started to generate the questions for me. If I could encourage you to provide some jump starters on the following:
What do you recommend to use to monitor or test air quality? Both indoor & outdoor.
What specifically should I be looking to monitor? What is critical vs what is nice.
Indoor vs Outdoor - Are they monitoring the same thing? How do I know when one makes more sense then the other. i.e. do I open the window or is it better to leave it closed. In particular this is tricky if monitoring different things.
Does running my HVAC on a circulating cycle make a difference vs just leaving it set to AUTO? Or is that a seasonal question as it runs at different rates. (Excluding having any other ventilating system.)
I am just getting started, but this seems like a good baseline. I did do some preliminary research, but did not find much and what little I found seemed weak in terms of validating.
I appreciate your time and look forward to your valuable insights. If you have a preferred forum for these type of questions, please let me know. Thanks again.
Not sure if you ever got your answers but as to the fan being set to on vs auto it depends on the season for your setup. In summer while running cooling it needs to be on auto, and the reason is while running your evaporator coil collects and slowly drains away water that it has just removed from the air(humidity) but after the ac shuts off that coil stays wet for quite a while so what happens is that water, if air continues to flow over it, re evaporates back into the air as water vapor(humidity) 💧 and you'll never get your space comfortable not to mention the health risks. The fan on setting is really only for shoulder seasons where you don't need heating or cooling. If you run fan on constant during heating you would feel more cool draft which many people don't want due to circulating room temp air vs hot or warm air like when furnace or heatpump is running. For opening windows, that's really an hour by hour decision as the weather can change drastically from morning to night or even overnight. Watch your weather every day,get your local weather app on your phone as well. Without getting into talking about dewpoint I'd say if the temp outside is a temp you'd be comfortable and the humidity is below 60rh open the house up.
Great interview. For residential homeowners who are interested in monitoring the air quality inside the home, what systems work well? Assuming we start using better filtration, changing the filter more frequently, and adding a gasket around the filter to prevent bypass, what can we do to monitor the air quality? What does your experience show?
I really like the Airthings line of monitors, along with Broan’s new Overture system. Some people also like HAVEN, which is a one-point measurement in the return duct.
To the customer that doesn't know. My elevator pitch is 'your AC just makes the air cold and hot, it doesn't clean the air, and 1 thing further, what grows in cold, dark, and wet areas? (They know the answer is mold of course) Thats what is going on in your system without any IAQ solutions.' That is a quick eye opener to start the IAQ conversation I've found.
Fantastic talk. Learned a lot. Thank you for this.
Me too- thanks Ecospider5
Remarkable conversation!
Thanks for listening Glen!
I also feel strongly about a ducted system, also because I want the air filtered. I also don't want a thousand different things to maintain in every room, like you get with the ductless units.
Please interview him on the minisplits.
Thanks, will do
Such a great interview!!
Thanks Nora
Does Dr.Seigel have any published material on his research? Id like to be able to read some of it.
135 publications listed, have a ball!
www.researchgate.net/scientific-contributions/Jeffrey-A-Siegel-74417137
I should use my countertop distiller for water for my airwasher, I assumed, at the 46:00 pause, to consider venting my stove vent to outside.
You guys are too smart to be legal in this country. If it looks pretty enough and is cheep enough, it must be a Great American Home. Thanks for some amazing information!
Haha please don’t tell anyone
99.99% of residential HVAC companies have Zero clue how to design a UV light system. Even the owner of the company I work for has no experience in designing a system that uses UV or Photovoltaic light. It's not worth the gamble, stick to a fan and a filter.
Right on
@@HomePerformance are UV systems like Reme Halo it Bipolar ionization products like iwave-r unsafe?
I saw a discussion about the high filtration air filters and the results indicated that unless your system is made for a high quality filter, you are reducing the ability of the HVAC to work properly. (It can't move the air through the system. Will lead to poor heating or cooling of the structure)
You can simply upsize the filter to increase the surface area, which lowers the static pressure stress on the blower. You can put any high quality on any quality of system, provided it’s big enough.
@@HomePerformance They didn't try that. They just replaced, say a 20x20 with another 20x20, and you see the lower air flow in the vents.
Of course- that’s the same dumb argument technique as when they say a murderer will do the same job with a baseball bat if we take away his AR-15. It’s just meant to shut down the discussion.
Great interview. Can Dr. Jeff discuss negative ion plasma generators such as iWave and it’s efficacy in improving IAQ ?
He did- anything that makes ions has side effects for chemistry. Ions make ozone.
He never mentioned using UV lights as a way of keeping things from growing on the inside surfaces of an air handler. Therefore keeping them from being released into the conditioned space. What do you think his opinion would be on that aspect?
I’ll ask him next time BUT I have several other scientists telling me that a HIGH QUALITY UV-C cleaned snd maintained at the coil is a good idea without many side effects.
Hey Corbett, great podcast good sir! Will you be attending the Building Science Symposium this weekend in KansasCity??
Thanks man! Will not, but hope it goes well. Will be at the Builders Show and AHR.
@@HomePerformance
Can you share the info? I’d like to potentially attend if possible.. We are preparing for a realm of building that we have very little resources locally..
Sounds good! Just search Builders Show 2022 and AHR Expo 2022 (Jan/Feb in Orlando and Vegas) and the National Home Performance Conference (Nashville in April)
Great interview!
Thanks Roger
very good info
Thanks Dan
Interesting, informative, enjoyable - a trifecta.
Many thanks!
Sounds like water filtration is even more important than just drinking if you have a humidifier. I have never seen this talked about with whole home units.
I will have to look at the cost of using distilled water with my large standing unit.
Yes, pretty interesting
After years of being ill when my over sized furnace ran, I opened up the drywall ceiling to find old, leaky ductwork that was falling apart, had been tampered or modified and large 3" gapping holes in the return duct with 40 yrs of construction filthy and rockwool insulation covering them. Nothing is more dangerous than 40+ yr old old leaky, poorly designed ductwork, returns using ceiling and wall cavities and an over-sized furnace. All the filtration in the world will not solve this issue.
Quotes to replace system range and add high end filter range from $30K-$47K. It is a modest 2600 sq ft home. There is a lot to be said for ductless.
One takeaway from this for me is that I'd like to improve air flow in my 4-Bedroom house, and have it operate year round. Question: Sorry to be a bit OT, but I've watched many videos on this channel and am trying to figure out what air flow rate you designed your duct system for. More specifically what HVAC appliances stay on 24/7 (and flow rates) and which ones operate intermittantly. I think I've seen where your ERV has separate duct work. Would you mind sharing a schematic of the crawl space layout to show how the appliances interact overall? thank you.
Hey Bob- thanks for your enthusiasm for this channel and topic! I may do a video on this down the line, but HEPA (240 cfm) and heat pump (~500 cfm) stay on 24/7, with heat pump bumping up to 900 when conditioning, and dehum adding ~250 cfm when drying. Add to this the separate ERV system which pumps ~130 in/out 24/7. That's for 2200 sq ft, 30k cu ft.
@@HomePerformance Thank you for the response. Am I correct that your duct work is designed for full flow (@~1490 cfm)? How does the duct work perform at the lower flow of 740 cfm? IOW: What design compromises did you make in the duct work to deliver adequate flow at two (or three) different rates?
At lower flows, the only change is that velocity out of grilles is not as high, so it doesn’t agitate and mix the air- hence the ceiling fans on low.
Credit to Hank Rutkowski
There are scores of things to worry about when designing and installing a comfort system. Low velocity through a duct airway is not one of them.
@@dc1bamf Yeah, that's good to know. I was hypothesising that at lower static pressure (i.e. lower flow), there could be an unbalanced flow in the duct branches resulting in some rooms getting better flow than others. But, I suppose that couldn't happen because an imbalanced system would be evident at all flow rates. Thanks!
I wish I just had someone to tell me exactly how to build my hvac system.
Well every home is different, but helping people design complex HVAC systems is what I do a lot of lately. Feel free to book a session, James.
buildingperformanceworkshop.com/video-consulting
@@HomePerformance What's the best time the process to consult? early on...after floorplans, after renders, after building?
Earlier the better, imho, but for sure before you finalize your plans.
The equation basically goes, the time we're exposed to something, and the amount of that something, minus the amount our body is able to filter/dilute/render inert, is the time it takes for whatever harmful material to present its bill.
Radiation, for example. There's baseline, the background radiation we count as not being very hazardous within our expected lifetimes because it's unavoidable, 24/7 and it's just a fundamental bit of physics we're stuck with. And it hasn't managed to wipe us out yet. Move beyond baseline, even a little bit, and expose yourself to it for years. You may not notice tomorrow, or even 20 years from now, but the whole time it's been degrading your body until finally, someday, the bill comes due. And now you are noticeably, irreparably damaged. Get exposed to it a lot and once and then you're dead in days, hours, immediately.
Time to exposure, amount you're exposed.
We're educated in the dangers of radiation. Whether we are educated or not, doesn't matter. Physics doesn't care about what you do or don't know, it's going to keep doing it's thing regardless. Same thing with all of these substances coming from so many various materials in our homes. We can ventilate to try and get rid of it, but who says what you're pulling in isn't what your neighbor is also trying to ventilate away? Or all the car exhaust from the busy street you live on? We can filter, but unless you know the source of contamination, and wrap that around a fully enclosed bubble of filtration, you're still getting exposed to it. You just hope it'll now be low enough to not affect you within your expected lifetime.
I don't think IAQ's best destiny is to be improved first by ventilation and filtration. In the same way your cough isn't improved by a cough drop. We're doing our best to treat the symptoms, not cure the disease. I think when it comes to housing, we need a severe shift in focus from square footage and magazine indoor finishes at Walmart costs, to building somewhat (not even drastically smaller; $150/sq ft adds up real fast even cutting just a couple hundred square feet) smaller homes with materials that are as close to their original state as possible.
Even natural materials produce hazardous materials. Granite countertops, wood, stone, metals, nothing is free from entropy, and those shifting states that degrade the material composition of all things aren't putting out things that are great for our health. But that is literally the baseline, that is the lowest hanging fruit, and that's what we should be trying our best to build with unless we structurally or logistically can't.
I will happily cut 200-300+ square feet off my house if it means real wood floors versus luxury vinyl planks, granite versus laminate countertops, tile showers versus plastic enclosures, metal roof versus asphalt.
And THEN you ventilate and filter out the cat hair and whatever's left.
Deep thought, @Nerdineering- and you didn’t even step foot into how we should all be cleaning our homes better, not wallowing like a bunch of filthy animals ;)
@Home Performance
I'm staring at this field of carpeting pervading my apartment and weeping. Probably from all the cat hair that's already back in it again.
Thank you
Quite welcome
Performance degradation = KAPOW! Fascinating.
Dr. Siegel resembles the SNL and Portlandia actor Fred Armisen.
Thanks Bill! And yes, I saw the resemblance too. Any way we can make the things he’s saying a little less scary is good.
So merciless HVAC myth busting was a bit misleading. When I tell my commercial customers what it would take to deliver them clean fresh air through or along side their existing HVAC system they are usually pretty happy to drop a few grand to put a plug in HEPA scrubber every couple hundred square feet instead. It might not be perfect but it might be the best anyone can feasibly do I f the building wasn’t built with human health placed above cost to build, cost to operate (and even efficiency and comfort).
Pretty sure this channel isn’t about commercial buildings, Paul. Different channel.