Assessment of Selected Interior Flooring Materials On Indoor Air Quality

Abstract

Indoor air quality depends on many factors, such as temperature, humidity, odours or presence of pollutants. A lot of materials used in the buildings, either as structural materials or as furnishings, are mostly the indoor air pollution sources. Interior surface materials are generally accepted as the main TVOCs emissions source. The chemical and sensory assessment of selected interior flooring materials on indoor air quality is presented within the paper. Air acceptability, odour intensity and TVOCs concentration for selected interior flooring materials (polyvinyl chloride flooring, tongue flooring and acrylic based flooring) were tested. The chemical and sensory measurements were performed in a glass test chamber. The parameters were monitored by different air change rate per hour. Chemical measurement is based on the absorbed TVOCs gas chromatography analysis. The panellists of sensory assessment consist of group of responsible persons from 20 to 38 years (35% smokers). Each approached subject assesses the odour intensity and the air acceptability. The improving of sensory assessment with increasing the air change rate was not confirmed. Conversely, the unfavourable results are improving with increasing air change rate, in the case of materials with significantly indented and porous surface.