Why indoor air quality is important in the workplace

Improving employee productivity is a key goal for companies of any size. Having a healthy workplace is one of the concerns of companies. In fact, indoor air quality greatly influences the health of staff by influencing their well-being and creating productive and healthy work environments.

A company that does not take care of its employees does not inspire trust and can lose everything: customers, turnover, talent drain, etc. Therefore, the quality of the air breathed at work is a very important factor influencing the health of workers. Employers, therefore, have every interest in ensuring that their teams breathe good quality air. Good indoor air quality improves working conditions. In fact, the exposure to diseases increases by sharing closed spaces where the air circulates little and is hardly renewed. Not in vain, the indoor air is twice as polluted compared to the outside air. For several decades, this issue has fortunately been taken very seriously and the evolution of technology facilitates awareness of the subject. In addition, the current context of the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a review of indoor air quality standards.  

Indoor air is on average 5 to 7 times more polluted than outdoor air, whereas we spend 80 to 90% of our time there, mainly in our workplace. In question, many factors and pollutants can have an impact on health. To mention just one, CO2, which is one of these factors, is very present in buildings.

It is measured in ppm (part per million) or µg/m3. Indoor CO2 levels are generally higher than outdoors, due to CO2 exhaled by occupants. It should be noted that there can be harmful consequences when the concentrations are higher than approximately 1000 ppm such as health risks and a reduction in efficiency at work.  If the threshold is exceeded, the air is considered polluted and it is recommended not to temporarily occupy the room.

Most important, to minimize the risk of virus transmission through the air is keeping CO2 levels as low as possible in all indoor spaces. 

How to improve indoor air quality and CO2 impact

The following steps can be taken :

• Ventilate the rooms: it is recommended to open the windows as well as the doors on a regular basis to ventilate the premises and reduce the effects of confinement.
• Have good ventilation: an effective ventilation system is recommended to ensure good air renewal.
• Control sources of pollution: there are many sources of indoor pollution and it is important to limit them. 
• Take measurements using air quality sensors: these sensors make it possible to measure the levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the room but also other indoor pollutants (volatile organic compounds (VOC) etc.. in order to be able to make the right decisions and apply appropriate corrective measures.

For this, there are devices for measuring air quality which will allow knowing more about the air currently breathed. HibouAir is receommended in this regard. HibouAir is an affordable air quality monitoring device with a simple setup that provides all indoor environmental data for observations of CO2, VOC, PM, pressure, temperature, and humidity for a healthy environment. It is suitable for offices and other indoor places with a wide range of applications. This device comes with a cloud dashboard which allows accessing historical data remotely along with mobile and desktop applications. There are several solutions provided by HibouAir for indoor air quality monitoring.