The strong link between refurbishment and indoor air quality (IAQ) has been researched and a Protocol and supporting Management Information System have been developed to control IAQ problems in refurbishment work. The technical work comprised of three inter-related tasks. The first research task sought to establish methods of determining the building and IAQ condition before refurbishment to enable the planning of measures to control the pollutants arising from demolition and disposal of existing materials. The second task was to establish methods of controlling pollutant levels during refurbishment. The third task was to establish a refurbishment protocol.
Components of the Protocol include:
a database on pollutants from refurbishment materials and process and their threshold limit values (TLV);
a methodology for building diagnostics and IAQ surveys of existing buildings;
specifications of measures to control pollutants through treatment of materials at source, organization and management procedures for the work and, design and Operation of heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) systems (including a model for estimating the pollution load and rate of decay of the pollution, during and after the application of some selected building materials);
specification of a system for monitoring and evaluating IAQ in refurbishment work;
refurbishment protocol for IAQ assurance and instruction manuals for use of the protocol;
an information system to support implementation of the Protocol which logs all control measures taken into a project database.he detec