'Het zou mogelijk moeten zijn gebouwen te bouwen die al gezond zijn'

De afgelopen jaren is veel geld uitgetrokken voor duurzame en energie-efficiënte gebouwen. Ten aanzien van gezonde gebouwen begint dit langzaam op gang te komen. Een goede zaak, want een ongezond binnenmilieu kan leiden tot een behoorlijke afname van de productiviteit van werknemers en een stijging van de gezondheidskosten door astma en allergie gerelateerde ziekten

The need for occupant-related and building-related indicators in our guidelines for indoor environmental quality

Research has shown that, even though the indoor environmental conditions seem to comply with current guidelines and those conditions seem ‘comfortable’ enough, staying indoors is not good for our health. Reasons for this discrepancy might be the fact that these guidelines are based on single-dose response relationships to prevent negative effects, and that the criteria are determined for an average adult person, ignoring interactions occurring between stressors at human as well as environmental level. The fact that we are dealing with individuals in different scenarios (e.g. homes, offices, schools) and situations (e.g. sitting behind a desk, listening to the teacher, cooking, sleeping,) is ignored

Towards new methods and ways to create healthy and comfortable buildings

Many ways, tools and concepts have been developed to determine performance indicators and criteria for healthy and comfortable buildings, focusing in general on the prevention of health and comfort problems. Perhaps the most important observation in these ways, tools and concepts is the fact that because dose-response relations in general are incomplete, most indicators do not seem to be useful. A second observation is the fact that interactions occurring at different levels (at human level, parameters of the indoor environment and at building level) are not taken into account. Moreover, the timeframe taken is often static (at a certain point in time) and not dynamic. Comparing static performance indicators with a dynamic process (being exposed in a building) will therefore most likely result in a non-valid outcome. And last but not least it is observed that the perception of positive stimuli are in general not considered. There is a need for a different or at least an adapted approach towards evaluation of health and comfort of occupants in the indoor environment: an integrative multi-disciplinary approach taking account of positive and negative stimuli and concerned with "real" needs of people. © 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Understanding the indoor environment and its effects: Part 1. Field study of 21 primary schools

This article presents the survey performed in 21 schools based on the integratedanalysis approach, to collect information on ‘Stressors and effects’, ‘Preferences and needs’ and ‘Interactions at environment level’, for different situations

Klimaatbeheersing. Nieuwe uitdagingen voor TNO.

De afweging tussen energiegebruik en com-fort wordt steeds belangrijker. Dit geldt zowel voor het ontwerp, als het beheer van gebouw en installaties. Bij TNO Bouw, afde-ling Gezonde Gebouwen en Installaties, doet men onderzoek om deze afweging inzichte-lijk te kunnen maken. Daarbij wordt tegelij-kertijd gewerkt aan concepten waarbij com-fort en energiebesparing samengaan. Een gesprek met de heer Ir. C. W.J. Cox en mevrouw Dr. Ir. P.M. Bluyssen, beiden werk-zaam op de genoemde afdeling van TNO