Question

Customarily, people tend to spend most of their time indoor at home and in the workplace. As such, it is essential to improve Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) to enhance occupants’ health and wellbeing. Recommend three (3) IEQ aspects including daylighting and rationalise their interrelations with design decisions supported by scientific evidences or means to secure office building users’ comfort, health, and productivity.

Answer 1

Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) is most simply described as the conditions inside the building. It includes air quality, but also access to daylight and views, pleasant acoustic conditions, and occupant control over lighting and thermal comfort. It may also include the functional aspects of space such as whether the layout provides easy access to tools and people when needed and whether there is sufficient space for occupants. Building managers and operators can increase the satisfaction of building occupants by considering all of the aspects of IEQ rather than narrowly focusing on temperature or air quality alone. Americans spend the majority of their time indoors; not surprisingly, studies have shown an increase in worker productivity when improvements are made to a space’s IEQ.

Daylighting :

Daylighting uses natural daylight as a substitute for electrical lighting. While it will likely be counterproductive to eliminate electrical lighting completely, the best proven strategy is to employ layers of light - using daylight for basic ambient light levels while providing occupants with additional lighting options to meet their needs.

An effective daylighting strategy appropriately illuminates the building space without subjecting occupants to glare or major variations in light levels, which can impact comfort and productivity.

In order to provide equitable access to daylight ensure the space is optimized to disperse daylight well. Locate private offices toward the core of the space and specify low workstation panels. Use glass walls and light-colored surfaces on walls and desks to disperse daylight throughout the space. In all daylighting strategies, it is important to consider glare and to take steps to minimize it.

Indoor air quality (IAQ) :

Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) refers to the state of the air within a space. A space with good indoor air quality is one that is low in toxins, contaminants and odors. Good air quality possible when spaces are well ventilated (with outside air) and protected from pollutants brought into the space or by pollutants off-gassed within the space. Strategies used to create good IAQ include bringing in 100% outside air, maintaining appropriate exhaust systems, complying with ASHRAE Standard 62.1, utilizing high efficiency MERV filters in the heating ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) system, installing walk-off mats at entryways, prohibiting smoking with the space and near operable windows and air intakes, providing indoor plants, and using only low-emitting / non-toxic materials and green housekeeping products.

Thermal Comfort :

Avoiding over-cooling in summer, which is very common, and overheating in winter can improve occupant thermal comfort and cut energy costs. At the same time, work performance will often be improved. Avoiding elevated temperatures can also improve satisfaction with air quality and reduce sick building symptoms. Large thermal zones controlled by a single thermostat are one common source of poor thermal control. Ceiling fans can enhance thermal comfort in warm environments at low energy cost . There is potential for radiant systems to improve thermal comfort by allowing finer zonal control, where the local gains and losses (e.g., hot or cold interior surfaces because of glazing) can be more easily balanced by surface temperature control

Acoustics

A survey of 101 California buildings (including offices, public buildings, educational buildings, hospital, etc.) found the lowest satisfaction ratings for noise level (37% dissatisfied) and sound privacy (60% dissatisfied) (Moezzi et al., 2014), indicating that acoustic conditions are very important for occupant satisfaction. There are many complex relationships affecting privacy and acoustic quality (e.g., organizational culture, nature of work, management structure, and worker psychology) that should be considered when designing the office layout. For example, a study of fifteen LEED-certified office buildings found that among the three open-plan office types, occupants in bullpen configurations were more satisfied with acoustic quality than those in cubicles (Lee, 2010). This suggests that better understanding of occupant psychology (e.g., bullpen type offices allow workers to adjust work etiquettes in response to their neighboring coworkers) may be more important than having partitions.

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