Healthy Building Science

How to Improve the Air Quality in Your Home and Car During Wildfire Season Check out our new blog!

How to know your building is clean and safe. Healthy Building Science now offers a Cleaning Verification Audit and Coronavirus testing to assess the effectiveness of cleaning related to Coronavirus (e.g., SARS-CoV-2). The goal of a cleaning audit is to verify, through a combination of visual inspection and surface testing, that cleaning procedures are being consistently practiced and that surface cleaning has been successful. #covid19 #surfacetesting #cleaningverification #coronavirus

The CDC has launched an online tool to help select disinfectants to kill the CV-19 virus. When cleaning it is most important to remember: 1. Clean the dirty surface first. Remove dirt with soap and water. 2. To disinfect the surface, apply the disinfectant and leave it wet for 15 seconds to 15 minutesfollow the recommendation on the product label.... #COVID19 #Disinfect See more

Mitigating Potential COVID-19 Exposure-with HVAC systems Check out our new blog!

Hello beautiful ..... Rhizopus, Aspergillus niger, Aspergillus oryzae and Penicillium. Check out these gorgeous timelapse mold videos.

The CDC has launched an online tool to help select disinfectants to kill the CV-19 virus. When cleaning it is most important to remember: 1. Clean the dirty surface first. Remove dirt with soap and water. 2. To disinfect the surface, apply the disinfectant and leave it wet for 15 seconds to 15 minutesfollow the recommendation on the product label.... #COVID19 #Disinfect See more

Very smart DIY facemark made from HVAC furnace filter. #stayhealthy #heathybuildingscience #facemask

This no sew face mask design from The American Industrial Hygiene Association, whose mission is "Creating knowledge to protect worker health." #diyfacemask #stayhealthy #covid19

"The Biowall is an eco-friendly air filtration system that can be used in residential buildings to improve air quality." Purdue University and Whirlpool Corp teamed-up to build ReNEWW house by transforming an existing residential home into a research laboratory. #IAQ #healthyhomes #microbialcommunity

Even our inspectors need a AQI refresher. Check out this #smokewave blog post from last year. #kincadefire #AirQuality #purpleair

We can help test for respirable silica to determine if and how much silica dust is in your work area.

Is Conference Room Air Making You Dumber?

Is my porch covered in lead contaminated dust?

There is strong evidence that ship engine exhaust impacts air quality in port and coastal cities, but little is known about how ship engine exhaust may impact the air quality on the deck of a ship. The heavy fuel used by one cruise ship causes as much air pollution as one million cars in the same period of time. Check out this impressive study done by stand.earth https://www.stand.earth//2019-an-investigation-of-air-poll

Very interesting radio piece on health effects of wildfire smoke. Researchers are seeing profound health concerns from wild fire smoke when looking at hospital visits after the last major CA wildfire, the Tubbs Fire. Three to 5 months after fires contained local ER rooms saw 20% more patients visits that related to heart and breathing problems. #airquality #healthyhomes #environmentaljustice

Here in San Francisco and surrounding areas kids are stuck indoors during this smoke wave with little or no air filtration. San Francisco’s older school buildings are not set up to have building-wide air filtration. The SFUSD’s current response to the unhealthy air quality is to close windows and stay indoors with no current plans for air filtration due to cost. Since the last fires, I have been curious about the DIY Box Fan air purifier made from items found in most hardware... stores- box fan, 20in x 20in x 1in MERV 13 filter and some duct tape. (At the time of writing this article some big box hardware stores were sold out of filters.) There is a serious need for air filtration in schools and homes. How well will this DIY set-up clean the air? Following the instructions from the Mariposa County Health Department How to Build an Inexpensive Room Filter (https://www.mariposacounty.org//DIY_RoomAirFilter201807_FE), I made our Box Fan room filter. This DIY set-up was compared to a HEPA air purifier, AeraMax 300. In two separate rooms, one with the Box Fan and one with the HEPA filter air purifier, I measured particulates before and during air filtration for about 50 minutes. The air filters were set up at 13 feet from the particle counter. I also took one reading at 2 feet from each of the air filters at 50 minutes. Using a Lighthouse 3016-IAQ Laser particle counter, air samples were collected for 2 minutes, with a 2 min delay. Box Fan was able to drop PM2.5 particulates down 71%, the HEPA filter dropped the PM2.5 down 88%. See complete results in chart below. After testing, I was impressed how well the DIY Box Fan was able to remove particulates from the air. Yes, HEPA will provide more filtration, but if cost is an issue then the DIY Box Fan MERV 13 is a sensible choice. Further testing needs to be done with higher MERV ratings and over longer periods of time. Written by Anne-Lise Breuning, Environmental Inspector