Mother Nature, unforgiving with wasteful and inefficient strategies, just sent a memo on designing HVAC systems to both support occupant health and reduce energy consumption. Let’s take a look.

We are in a new era — a time of increased realization that the indoor environment has a powerful influence on human health.

What should we do with all these gray-haired baby boomers? Do the brilliant and bold youngsters who seem to dominate the world of creativity and innovation still have a place for us?

During ASHRAE’s June 2019 annual meeting in Kansas City, I became optimistic that the society is truly expanding its horizons to include occupant health as an important building performance metric.

Have you ever wondered how chemical compounds or microbes actually get into the cells of your body and have a powerful influence on your health?

From my perspective of working in the intersection of two very different professions, medicine and design of the built environment, I’m frequently surprised by the resistance of each group to embrace concepts from the “other side.

Once again, research has revealed an entire new dimension of the role of indoor air quality in determining human health.

When a building is found to be consuming excess energy, the next step is usually an energy audit followed by retro-commissioning of the HVAC system. If available, an infrared scan of the building exterior might follow.

Once upon a time, humans lived outdoors in harmony with vast and diverse populations of bacteria, fungi, and viruses, largely unaware of the presence of these microbes.

Now that we are well into the winter of 2019, designers and managers of commercial buildings in cold climates may be concerned about the efficiency of their HVAC systems.