Radio Frequency Electromagnetic Fields Exposure Assessment in Indoor Environments: A Review.

Emma Chiaramello,Marta Parazzini,Gabriella Tognola,Joe Wiart,Serena Fiocchi,Paolo Ravazzani,Marta Bonato

doi:10.3390/ijerph16060955

Abstract

Exposure to radiofrequency (RF) electromagnetic fields (EMFs) in indoor environments depends on both outdoor sources such as radio, television and mobile phone antennas and indoor sources, such as mobile phones and wireless communications applications. Establishing the levels of exposure could be challenging due to differences in the approaches used in different studies. The goal of this study is to present an overview of the last ten years research efforts about RF EMF exposure in indoor environments, considering different RF-EMF sources found to cause exposure in indoor environments, different indoor environments and different approaches used to assess the exposure. The highest maximum mean levels of the exposure considering the whole RF-EMF frequency band was found in offices (1.14 V/m) and in public transports (0.97 V/m), while the lowest levels of exposure were observed in homes and apartments, with mean values in the range 0.13–0.43 V/m. The contribution of different RF-EMF sources to the total level of exposure was found to show slightly different patterns among the indoor environments, but this finding has to be considered as a time-dependent picture of the continuous evolving exposure to RF-EMF.

Highlights

The pervasive use of wireless communication devices in each aspect of everyone daily life, emphasized the need for assessing the level of radio-frequency electromagnetic field (RF-electromagnetic fields (EMFs))exposure
The results are organized as follows: first, an overview of which radio-frequency electromagnetic field (RF-EMF) sources, indoor environments and assessment strategies were used for evaluating the RF-EMF exposure levels in the various considered studies
In the second part the numerical values of the RF-EMF exposure levels found in different studies were summarized by indoor environment

Summary

Introduction

The pervasive use of wireless communication devices in each aspect of everyone daily life, emphasized the need for assessing the level of radio-frequency electromagnetic field (RF-EMF). Several studies aimed to estimate the exposure level for RF-EMF source in the 10 MHz–6 GHz frequency range, related to radio and television broadcasting, base stations for telecommunications and mobile phones, cordless (DECT) phones, RF identification tagging systems, and wireless communications applications, such as WiFi, wireless local area network (WLAN) and mobile telecommunications networks—Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM), Universal Mobile. Telecommunications System (UMTS) and Long Term Evolution (LTE) [1]. Different approaches with different levels of accuracy have been used to estimate RF-EMF exposure, e.g., spot and long term measurements, personal measurements with portable exposimeter, simulations based on computational electromagnetics techniques. Public Health 2019, 16, 955; doi:10.3390/ijerph16060955 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph

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