Abstract
Indoor air contamination in office rooms is regarded as one of the most important issues in the protection of workers’ health, because contaminants, even those occurring at low concentrations, can cause health problems for the office staff in view of the long exposure time. This paper presents the results of measurements of benzene and its alkyl derivatives (toluene, ethylbenzene, xylenes, styrene, and 1,3,5-trimethylbenzene)—known indicators of human exposure to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in the air in newly renovated offices at University of Technology (Upper Silesia, Poland). Monthly samples of indoor and outdoor air were collected during the years 2018–2019 by passive methods and analyzed by thermal desorption-gas chromatography with flame ionization detector (TD-GC/FID). In the first month of measurements average concentrations of the sum of five VOCs under consideration was 127.7 µg/m3, then in subsequent months between 15.1 µg/m3 to 87.3 µg/m3. The average concentration of carcinogenic benzene was below 1.5 μg/m3. Toluene had the highest concentration among studied VOCs, accounting for as high as 60% and 84% of the total indoor and outdoor VOCs, respectively. High indoor-to-outdoor (I/O) ratios for ethylbenzene (7.1), m,p-xylene (9.8), and styrene (12.5) indicate the dominant role of indoor sources.
Highlights
Indoor air quality (IAQ) can considerably affect human health and well-being
The issue of IAQ has attracted a great deal of attention of researchers, because people spend approximately 90% of their time indoors [1,2,3]—in homes, offices, schools, shops, and public spaces [4,5,6,7]
IAQ is strictly dependent on the occurrence of various biological, physical and chemical pollutants [1]
Summary
Indoor air quality (IAQ) can considerably affect human health and well-being. Offices create work places for majority of population, where people spend over 12% of their life. It makes the indoor air quality extremely vital. Among chemical organic compounds used to evaluate indoor air quality by WHO, formaldehyde (HCHO), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) [1] are pointed. VOCs are known for their adverse impact on human health even at trace levels [10]. Exposure to VOCs can have acute and chronic effects on health due to their chemical structure which results in carcinogenic, and non-carcinogenic effects [10,11]
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