Indoor Air Quality Investigation of Public Sites in Isolated Islands within Taiwan Strait

Abstract

The selected 21 public sites for indoor air quality (IAQ) investigation located at Penghu and Kinmen Islands (Taiwan). IAQ measurements include CO2, CO, HCHO, TVOCs, bacteria, fungi, PM10, PM2.5, O3 and temperature, which were conducted during year 2010 and 2011. The results showed that the concentrations of CO, HCHO, PM10 and PM2.5 were below Taiwan EPA’s suggested IAQ threshold levels at all public sites. CO2 concentrations at hospitals and school are all exceeding category 1 threshold of 600 ppm. Besides, the levels of O3 and bacteria for hospitals and fungi for schools were all higher than the suggested IAQ threshold levels. One supermarket was found exceeding the suggested IAQ threshold levels on TVOCs and CO2. The theater was found exceeding the suggested bacteria threshold. This study discovered that the high CO2, bacteria and fungi levels occurred at various public sites. Accordingly, the regulated strategy of crowd control and air conditioning management was required for a healthy indoor environment.

Indoor exposure levels of bacteria and fungi in residences, schools, and offices in China: A systematic review

“…Finally, 55 studies met the criteria, among which 28 were in Chinese, and 27 were in English. 25, 13 studies focused on office buildings, 34,[42][43][44]46,67,69,71,72,[74][75][76]80 26 studies were related to scho ols, 25,27,29,35,[38][39][40][41]43,[47][48][49]51,52,54,56,58,60,61,[64][65][66]68,72,73,77 and 20 studies investigated residences. 28,[30][31][32][33]36,37,45,50,53,55,…”

“…81 More than half of these researches on schools were done on university campuses. Compared to fungi, researchers were more concerned with bacterial concentrations, with 48 studies reported bacterial concentration levels, 25,[27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61]63,64,[66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76]80 and only 29 studies reported fungal concentration levels. 25,…”

“…The solid red line represents the Chinese standard 2500 CFU/m 3 for residence and office and 4000 CFU/m 3 for school. 25,[27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51]53,54,[57][58][59][60][61]63,64,[66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76]80 F I G U R E 5 Culturable fungal concentrations in residences, schools, and offices. The solid red line represents the WHO standard 500 CFU/m 3 ; there is no Chinese standard on fungal concentration level 25,28,29,33,36,39,40,42,50,52,54,55, For indoor fungi (Figure 7), average concentrations in hot summer and warm ...…”

“…63,65,67,68,70,71,[73][74][75][76][77][78][79] from indoor sources, especially indoor humans,24 so inadequate ventilation and warmer indoor temperature in cold climate areas cause indoor bacteria to grow and accumulate, which exceed the mean level in warm zones. In this study, offices in hot summer and warm winter zone are often equipped with mechanical ventilation, and the average indoor bacterial concentration is lower than that in the cold zone and the severe cold zone.…”

“…For fungi, the highest mean concentration is also in schools, which is 1.03 times of residences and 2.29 times of offices, respectively. Schools have the widest range of microbe concentrations.Low bacterial concentrations occur in cities on the southeast coast of China, such as Shanghai,41 Hong Kong,66 and Taiwan 73. However, high bacterial concentrations are found in cities in the north of China, such as Shenyang51 and Sanmenxia 48.…”