October is National Indoor Air Quality Awareness Month! Last week, The White House hosted a summit on Indoor Air Quality. The Summit brought together public health and ventilation experts, private sector and education leaders, and other stakeholders to discuss the importance clean indoor air plays in our lives. The summit promoted clean indoor air as a force multiplier for reducing the spread of infectious diseases like COVID-19. In case you missed it, watch the replay!
Watch The White House Summit on Indoor Air Quality
Earlier this year The White House launched the Clean Air in Buildings Challenge as a call to action for leaders and building owners of all types to commit to the importance of their indoor air quality and make monitoring, ventilation, filtration, and air cleaning a priority to keep their building occupants safe.
The administration also launched a new website where businesses, government entities, and schools can learn about the Clean Air in Buildings Challenge and publicly commit to participating in the challenge by signing the pledge. Sign the pledge now.
Spotlight on a Silent Threat: The White House Tackles Indoor Air
Did you know the air circulating inside buildings poses a major hidden health threat? While we fixate on polluted outdoor air, contaminants indoors frequently far exceed those levels. Yet we obliviously inhale this invisible menace over 90% of our days.
That disturbing data point drove the White House to confront the long-overlooked quality of air within America’s structures. This October, they convened the first-ever National Summit on Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) in Washington D.C.
On the agenda? Finding urgent solutions to airborne hazards imperiling citizens nationwide. After all, research links diseases exacerbated by dirty indoor air - from influenza to COVID - to nearly 900,000 premature deaths annually. Insufficient ventilation also hampers learning in schools and productivity in offices.
However, technologies to protect people inside buildings already exist – we just fail to deploy them. The summit spotlighted major near-term opportunities, like affordable sensors pinpointing risks in real-time and advanced filters trapping ultrafine particles that transmit viruses.
Attendee Dr. Richard Corsi of U.C. Davis stated, “It’s not rocket science to significantly reduce indoor contaminants. We know how – but we must ensure solutions help all Americans, leaving no community behind.”
Streamlining Standards and Upgrades
The current lack of coherent quality standards around indoor air enables ongoing exposure. The summit explored how enhanced ventilation guidelines, expanded sensor installation, and greater public education together can drive rapid, overdue IAQ improvements.
Wrapping aging buildings nationwide in “bubbles of clean, breathable air” carries billion-dollar benefits. Dramatically cutting health burdens and absenteeism also boosts outcomes in education, business, healthcare and beyond.
Now the question is how to finance and prioritize these indoor air innovations equitably. Policies that incentivize upgrades for affordable housing, schools, and high-risk facilities emerged as near-term targets. Partnerships between government, academia and corporations can further accelerate the deployment of emerging healthy building interventions.
Interested to learn more? Tune into the full White House IAQ Summit replay and hear transformative ideas firsthand from experts spanning science, construction, sustainability and the disability space. Combatting this silent scourge requires all voices and will reap enormous dividends.
Want to learn more about how Senseware can help monitor your Indoor Air Quality? Contact us today for more information.
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