ABSTRACT
Poor indoor air quality (IAQ) can be a significant health, environmental and economic problem, and has thus become a public health and liability issue for employers, as well as for building managers and owners. The ventilation rate and the thermal comfort of a building space must be considered key factors affecting IAQ. Low ventilation rates will cause odours from occupants and pollutants from indoor sources to accumulate, reducing air quality. People often assume that indoor air is very similar to the air just outside a given building. Variations in outdoor air quality may indeed be reflected in the indoor air, depending on the ventilation filtration system and on the intake location and amount of make-up air. Health effects associated with indoor air range from severe to subjective, generally non-specific symptoms that sufferers attribute to poor-quality air, the environment. Regulation of the quality of indoor air in Australia is minimal, especially compared with that of outdoor air and industrial workplace air.
