Air Cleaning Technologies for Indoor Air Quality (ACT-IAQ)
(2004-2006)
PI: Dr. Jensen Zhang (jszhang@syr.edu)
Other Key Investigators: Dr.
Z. Zhang, W. Chen, B. Guo and J. Smith
People in average spend about 90% of their
time indoors. The quality of air in
office, residential, school, and industrial buildings (such as the printing
shops) can significantly affect the health and productivity of building
occupants. It has been estimated that
the potential productivity gain through improved IAQ are over $40 billion to
$250 billion per year in the
Despite the great potential of air
cleaning technologies for improving indoor air quality (IAQ) and saving
energy used for ventilating, heating and conditioning air, test results from a
recent study[1]
have shown that existing room air cleaning products are not effective in
removing the wide range of volatile organic compounds typically found
indoors. There are many design
deficiencies in the exiting air cleaning products, ranging from poor selection
of sorption media or catalytic oxidization materials, to undesirable
orientation and placement of UV-light irradiation relative to the catalytic
surfaces and poor airflow management in the cleaning devices.
The goals of this project are to develop an integrated
and optimized design method of applying air cleaning technologies to
improve IAQ in general, and use this design method to develop a specific air
cleaning technology for controlling the air quality in printing spaces in
order to minimize the exposure of workers to harmful pollutants and
prevent/mitigate the effects of the air environment on the performance of
printing machines.
It is anticipated that the
outcomes of this initiative will positively impact public health and comfort
levels in homes and businesses. The
design method and enhanced IAQ simulation model developed through this project
will help building designers and managers develop or select effective air
cleaning methods for IAQ control. They
will also help air cleaning manufacturers to improve their products and develop
new ones.
[1]
Evaluation of Air Cleaning/purification Technologies, a research project
sponsored by NYSERDA, National Grid, NYIEQ, and