Effect of Indoor Environment on Occupant Air Comfort and Productivity in Office Buildings: A Response Surface Analysis Approach
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Indoor Air Comfort
3. Research Design
3.1. Survey Design
3.2. Physical Parameters Measurement
3.3. Data Analysis: Response Surface Methodology
4. Results
4.1. Analysis of Variance
4.2. Regression Analysis
−0.370 Temperature + 0.1035 Outside Temperature
+0.0353 Outside Relative Humidity + 0.1930 Sound +
−0.863 Kind of Workspace_1 − 0.306 Kind of Workspace_2
+1.322 Kind of Workspace_3 + 0.47 Kind of Workspace_4
−0.621 Kind of Workspace_5 + 1.658 Do you sit near (wall type):_1
+0.241 Do you sit near (wall type):_2
−0.448 Do you sit near (wall type):_3
−1.451 Do you sit near (wall type):_4
4.3. Response Surface Analysis
4.3.1. Relationship between Outside Temperature, Illumination and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.2. Relationship between Outside Temperature, Sound and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.3. Relationship between Outside Temperature, Outside Relative Humidity and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.4. Relationship between VOC, Temperature and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.5. Relationship between VOC, Relative Humidity and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.6. Relationship between Cardon Dioxide, Illumination and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.7. Relationship between Sound, Carbon Dioxide and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.8. Relationship between Outside Relative Humidity, Carbon Dioxide and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.9. Relationship between Outside Temperature, Carbon Dioxide and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.10. Relationship between Temperature, Carbon Dioxide on Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.11. Relationship between Relative Humidity, Carbon Dioxide and Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
4.3.12. Effect of VOC and Carbon Dioxide on Indoor Air Comfort and Productivity
5. Discussion
5.1. Carbon Dioxide
5.2. Relative Humidity
5.3. Volatile Organic Compound
5.4. Outside Relative Humidity & Outside Temperature
5.5. Temperature
5.6. Illumination
6. Conclusions
Supplementary Materials
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Conflicts of Interest
Appendix A
References
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No | Reference | Focus Area within IAQ | Findings |
---|---|---|---|
1 | [58] | Components of indoor air–VOC | This research provided VOC measurement protocols and data to reduce exposure to pollutant sources. |
2 | [22] | Components of indoor air–VOC | Predicting IAQ in office buildings is possible through laboratory emission testing of products. |
3 | [61] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | The research focuses on preventing adverse effects of all IEQ on occupants, including an integrated analysis assessing IAQ. |
4 | [21] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | A study on the comfort of workers in office buildings showed that perceived comfort, including indoor air quality factors, is a phenomenon that deserves more research. |
5 | [34] | Components of indoor air | This study emphasizes the importance of designing adaptable spaces as it reveals the association between building characteristics and IEQ, including IAQ. |
6 | [32] | Ventilation systems | This paper revealed occupants’ preference for some hybrid ventilation systems over others, specifically those systems that allowed high degrees of direct user control. |
7 | [46] | Ventilation systems | This study examines the potential application of ventilation systems with thermal energy storage, revealing how this system saves electrical energy by 16.9–50.8%. |
8 | [62] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | This study reveals the adverse impacts of subdivided housing units on IAQ through increasing levels of CO2 and VOCs, which threatens the health of occupants, especially young children. |
9 | [29] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | The focus of this research was to better understand the impact of several IEQ factors (odours, air movement, available space, etc.) that are not substantial to the overall workspace contentment on their own, but their effects become significant when these factors are merged into broader environmental parameters (i.e., Perceived Air Quality, Acoustics, Layout and Thermal). |
10 | [43] | Ventilation systems | This research focuses on the Ventilation rate aspect of the ground source heat pump system from the perspective of energy saving and indoor thermal comfort combined. It constructed different settings that considered various ventilation techniques and different cooling capacities. |
11 | [63] | Components of indoor air–CO2 levels | A literature review that summarises results from 37 studies linking high levels of indoor CO2 with impaired cognitive function. |
12 | [39] | Ventilation systems | This study uncovers how the application of hybrid or mixed-mode ventilation systems in harsh, dry climates has the potential to provide suitable indoor environments through highly effective office building design. |
13 | [56] | Components of indoor air | A critical paper that introduced the Olf and the decipol, the units that provide a rational basis for calculating ventilation requirements and for predicting and measuring air quality indoors and outdoors. |
14 | [64] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | This study examined indoor environmental parameters, including IAQ and building features that primarily affect occupants’ satisfaction in US office buildings. Satisfaction with the amount of space was ranked the most important for workspace satisfaction. |
15 | [44] | Ventilation systems | This study focused on the effects of green certifications, ventilation types and office types on occupant satisfaction, revealing that hybrid ventilation systems achieve high environmental satisfaction. |
16 | [33] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | This study presents a post-occupancy evaluation of office spaces over twenty years, revealing that levels of satisfaction were mainly related to spaces of interaction, followed by the amount of light and cleanliness; dissatisfaction was related to sound privacy, followed by temperature and noise level. |
17 | [40] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | This case study compared the effects of naturally ventilated (NV) office environments to mechanically ventilated (MV) offices and revealed that occupants in NV buildings adapted to a vast range of environmental conditions. In contrast, those in MV offices were less tolerant of small changes in their environmental conditions. |
18 | [28] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | A significant study summarises human symptoms and discomfort in the built environment, formulating the Sick Building Syndrome. |
19 | [55] | Ventilation systems | This study reveals that although ventilation rates are a significant aspect of controlling airborne concentrations, it does not visibly influence levels of total volatile organic compounds (TVOC). |
20 | [25] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | A significant study that delved into understanding the relationship between indoor air pollution and health in the late 1990s, which also considered the Sick Building Syndrome (SBS). |
21 | [45] | Ventilation systems | This study investigated the relationship between different ventilation systems and occupants’ satisfaction in an office environment. It revealed that in Naturally Ventilated (NV) buildings, good thermal conditions were associated with increased overall satisfaction, but there was little noticeable unfavourable impact when thermal performance was poor. In air-conditioned buildings, thermal conditions were linked with negative evaluations of the workspace. Finally, thermal conditions in hybrid ventilated buildings showed positive and negative impacts of similar amounts on overall satisfaction. |
22 | [8] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | This paper’s focus was the impact of indoor air quality on productivity loss in air-conditioned office buildings. |
23 | [50] | Components of indoor air—VOC | The focus of this research is to provide a summary of indoor/outdoor air levels of VOCs in buildings. It discusses the methods and techniques that have been applied so far to assess VOCs indoors and outdoors. |
24 | [47] | Ventilation systems | This study examined the use of natural and mechanical ventilation in 46 apartments. Occupants prioritised their thermal comfort needs over healthy indoor air quality (IAQ). |
25 | [35] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | This study investigated the effects of thermal discomfort in a workspace on perceived air quality, revealing that when occupants felt warm, they tended to assess the air quality as worse, hence their task performance decreased. |
26 | [18] | Components of indoor air–VOC | This study investigated the IAQ in Swedish housing stock, disclosing that even though ventilation appeared to be a source of NO2, increased ventilation rate seemed to reduce the indoor intensities of formaldehyde and total volatile organic compounds. |
27 | [37] | Ventilation systems | This study tested the effects of night ventilation on indoor air quality, showing that the night ventilation strategy had insignificant effects on microbial concentrations. At the same time, the VOC levels reached a minimum level after 2 h of ventilation. |
28 | [65] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | This study focused on the impact of air movement on perceived air quality and Sick Building syndrome, demonstrating that the energy-saving strategy of enhancing occupant comfort by moving room air at a high velocity and maintaining a high room temperature at a decreased supply of outdoor air or by a reduction of indoor air enthalpy must be vigilantly employed in buildings as the pollution level can still cause adverse health effects. |
29 | [41] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | The objective of this paper was to identify and critically evaluate research that links indoor environmental quality and individual productivity to develop a theoretical model that links green building features and initiatives in office buildings to individual productivity and organizational performance. |
30 | [17] | Impacts of IAQ on occupants | This study suggested five revolutionary principles for a philosophy of excellence for the 21st century: (1) improved indoor air quality enhances productivity and reduces SBS symptoms; (2) redundant indoor pollution causes should be evaded; (3) the air should be cool and dry for occupants; (4) a slight volume of clean air should be served close to the breathing zone of each occupant; (5) occupants should be given control of the indoor thermal environment. |
31 | [48] | Components of indoor air–VOC | The focus of this paper was to report on the most common procedures used in determining VOC levels. |
32 | [66] | Components of indoor air—CO2 levels | This paper describes the use of Carbon Dioxide in evaluating building IAQ and Ventilation in addition to factors that must be considered, such as ventilation system configuration and occupancy patterns. |
33 | [57] | Components of indoor air | This study employed a methodology for evaluating perceived air quality depending on air temperature, air humidity and air pollution caused by humans alongside an added extra parameter: air velocity. |
34 | [42] | Components of indoor air—CO2 levels | This research studied the relations of higher indoor carbon dioxide levels with impaired work performance, concluding that there are direct adverse effects of CO2 on human performance that could reduce energy-saving declines in outdoor air ventilation per person in buildings. |
35 | [11,15] | Components of indoor air—CO2 levels | These papers reviewed the relationship between ventilation rates and CO2 concentrations in office buildings with occupant health and risk of Sick Building Syndrome. |
36 | [26] | Ventilation systems | This study conducted a post-occupancy evaluation of residential buildings with two types of ventilation systems, centralized and decentralized; malfunctions were detected in some of the mechanical ventilation systems in the study. |
37 | [31] | Components of indoor air | This paper discusses factors influencing IAQ, retarding, stabilizing and promoting and presents how those factors influence the temperature, relative humidity and CO2 concentration. |
38 | [54] | Components of indoor air | This study focuses on what indoor air quality information should be gathered through the early stages of buildings to determine their indoor air quality performance. |
39 | [38] | Components of indoor air | This research investigated the perceived air quality, Sick Building Syndrome (SBS) symptoms and productivity in office buildings and demonstrated that ventilation rates should be above the minimum levels prescribed in standards and guidelines in the early 2000s. |
40 | [10,49] | Components of indoor air—VOC | Based on an analysis of indoor air pollutants in office environments, it is recommended in this study to measure selected compounds for odour and sensory irritation to assess indoor air quality and minimize irritation symptoms, deteriorated performance and cardiovascular and pulmonary effects. |
41 | [37] | Components of indoor air | This study analysed the human response to the indoor climate with two individually controlled convective and radiant cooling systems, emphasizing the need for personalized control to ensure that all occupants are content with indoor conditions. |
Indoor Air Quality | ||
---|---|---|
Measurable Parameters | Instrument | Occupant Survey |
Indoor pollutant level (Volatile Organic Compound) | Sensor | Occupants’ response to the indoor air quality |
Carbon Dioxide | Sensor |
Indoor Environment Factor | Very Negatively | Negatively | Neutral | Positively | Very Positively | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
A | Thermal comfort | |||||
B | Mechanical ventilation | |||||
D | Illumination levels | |||||
E | Daylight | |||||
F | Glare control | |||||
G | Views | |||||
H | Acoustic quality | |||||
K | Office Layout | |||||
L | Closeness to nature |
IEQ Factor | Parameter | Measured by | Input Variable | Response/Performance Variable |
---|---|---|---|---|
Thermal Comfort | Temperature (°C) | Zigbee T-3524C | (Calculated from the survey responses) | |
Relative humidity (%) | ||||
Outside temperature (°C) | Vantage Pro | |||
Outside RH (%) | ||||
Indoor Air Quality | Carbon Dioxide (P.P.M.) | Zigbee T-3571 | ||
Volatile Organic Compound (V.O.C. free air %) | Zigbee T-3576 | |||
Illumination | Lux level (lx) | |||
Noise | Sound level (dB) | Zigbee T-3551 | ||
Office Layout | Seating arrangement (room layout and access to window) | Researcher (Office plan) |
S. No. | Independent Variable 1 | Effect & Range | Independent Variable 2 | Effect & Range | Inference |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Illumination | 250–450 lux | Outside Temperature | Higher temperature leads to a negative impact Range: Below 35 °C | Both illumination and outside temperature influence indoor air comfort |
2 | Sound | Minimum or no effect | Outside Temperature | Higher temperature leads to a negative impact Range: Below 35 °C | Outside temperature influences indoor air comfort and productivity |
3 | Outside Relative Humidity | Higher outside humidity has a negative impact on indoor air comfort and productivity | Outside Temperature | Higher temperature leads to a negative impact Range: Below 35 °C | Both outside temperature and relative humidity have a negative effect |
4 | Temperature | A weak or indirect effect | Volatile Organic Compound | Higher VOC-free air results in better indoor air comfort and productivity Range: 70% & above | VOC presence reduces indoor air quality and productivity |
5 | Relative Humidity | Relative humidity has a higher impact than VOC Higher levels of relative humidity contribute to indoor air discomfort and are detrimental to productivity Range: up to 55 dB | Volatile Organic Compound | Weak impact—Lower VOC has a positive effect on indoor air quality. | VOC has less influence compared to relative humidity; however, it affects the impact of relative humidity on indoor air quality |
6 | Illumination | 250–450 lux | Carbon Dioxide | 600 ppm or below | Both illumination and carbon dioxide affect indoor air quality |
7 | Sound | No significant impact | Carbon Dioxide | 600 ppm | Carbon Dioxide has a strong impact |
8 | Outside Relative Humidity | No significant impact | Carbon Dioxide | 650 ppm or below | Carbon Dioxide has a strong impact |
9 | Outside Temperature | Positive impact up to 35°c | Carbon Dioxide | 800 ppm or below | Both outside temperature and carbon dioxide affect indoor air quality |
10 | Temperature | No significant impact | Carbon Dioxide | 500 ppm or below | Carbon Dioxide has a strong impact |
11 | Relative Humidity | No significant impact | Carbon Dioxide | 700 ppm or below | Carbon Dioxide has a strong impact |
12 | Volatile Organic Compound | No significant impact | Carbon Dioxide | 500 ppm or below | Carbon Dioxide has a strong impact |
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Kaushik, A.K.; Arif, M.; Syal, M.M.G.; Rana, M.Q.; Oladinrin, O.T.; Sharif, A.A.; Alshdiefat, A.S. Effect of Indoor Environment on Occupant Air Comfort and Productivity in Office Buildings: A Response Surface Analysis Approach. Sustainability 2022, 14, 15719. https://doi.org/10.3390/su142315719
Kaushik AK, Arif M, Syal MMG, Rana MQ, Oladinrin OT, Sharif AA, Alshdiefat AS. Effect of Indoor Environment on Occupant Air Comfort and Productivity in Office Buildings: A Response Surface Analysis Approach. Sustainability. 2022; 14(23):15719. https://doi.org/10.3390/su142315719
Chicago/Turabian StyleKaushik, Amit Kant, Mohammed Arif, Matt M. G. Syal, Muhammad Qasim Rana, Olugbenga Timo Oladinrin, Ahlam Ammar Sharif, and Ala’a Saleh Alshdiefat. 2022. "Effect of Indoor Environment on Occupant Air Comfort and Productivity in Office Buildings: A Response Surface Analysis Approach" Sustainability 14, no. 23: 15719. https://doi.org/10.3390/su142315719