Beyond Dewpoint: Water Films are HUGE for Homes, HVAC, and Indoor Pollution- Barb Turpin at CIE 

Oooh good catch John- that’s wise nerd advice!

What cleaning chemicals do you recommend?

You might want to try another sensor to ensure that your readings aren't just from a faulty one. Also, VOC readings aren't particularly helpful by themselves since any organic molecule in the air is going to set them off. One thing that tends to annoy me when people talk about VOCs is that there are literally tens of millions of known organic molecules with an endless array of properties. For example, acetic acid or formic acid mentioned in this video are going to be harmless at low concentrations. Your body already produces them in its own metabolism and has the biochemistry to handle them unless their concentration goes too high. Other VOCs like formaldehyde are fairly toxic and are more of a concern, though you'd have to look at scientific literature to see what the problematic levels are. Some of the VOCs emitted by black mold are extremely toxic and are going to be a concern even at trace levels for some people. Alternately, a fresh flower bouquet is going to be emitting crazy amounts of VOCs and I don't think anyone is losing sleep over whether you have flowers in your house. A single essential oil vaporizer could easily max out a VOC sensor. (and some essential oils can be quite harmful to people and pets, despite the claims of essential oil pushers) The sort of sensors that you can get on a home system are really basic and kind of marginal in their utility. They don't discriminate between VOCs and will give you different readings for the same concentration of two different VOCs because they will interact with the sensor differently. The analogy I would use is trying to use a single pixel light sensor to try and do valuations of paintings. All you can tell is the average brightness of the painting, but not much else. These sorts of sensors just tell you there's a lot of *something* in your air but not whether or not it's harmful. These researchers are using mass spectrometers which are multi-hundred-thousand dollar pieces of equipment that can actually break down the concentrations of all the different molecules in the air. That is the sort of instrument that is needed to really determine whether a high VOC level is actually a problem and how to solve it. If you live in a rural area, you could be measuring chemicals coming off of the plants in the area which are largely harmless. 1000 PPM seems high for a natural setting, so there might be something else at play but you may be at a point where bringing in a pro or academic researcher that actually has the tools to do a proper measurement is called for.

@danheidel I’m using 8 Airthings sensors around the house. I can usually see a big spike in one room then a delayed reading response all around the house. Thanks for the details from that perspective this could just be a window being opened in front of our flower beds. Hand location being put on or a million other things. So I might see if I can track it down a couple times but I’m just not going to worry about it. And yes people that put artificial scents into their house confuse me. Especially heated oils. I just don’t get it. And for me it gives me a migraine if the concentration is high enough.

NICE

Seems like if there's any risk of VOCs in your build, you'd be better off with a simple HRV and then a humidifier to temper your incoming air when you need that.

@@tealkerberus748 that’s an option for sure, but being on the cold edge of climate zone 6 in Canada, we’re talking about a major energy penalty to evaporate that much water.

@@superspeeder ouch. Yeah, that's a no-win situation. I hope you can find a better answer!

@@tealkerberus748 I’m hoping the answer is something like, “the concentrations of VOCs passed through the ERV core are so low they are not a concern.” Somehow I’m not feeling too lucky!!!

@@superspeeder That would be great! I think you'd need to start from the building specifications with things like zero VOC building materials, so no plastics, no foams, no OSB or chipboard, and so forth, and then likewise in running your house you'd need to be very careful about your cleaning products and the like. It's a lot of work, but it should be achievable in a new build, and forcing the building industry to work without these toxic products will make it easier for other people to follow what you're doing.

That's what I was wondering. Should we be filtering all our indoor air through what is essentially a bong?

@shubinternet that’s called an evaporative humidifier, and no I don’t think so. Next week is a big vid for this.

I favour an air washing system rather than a HEPA filter. The waste water from it should be safe enough to water a lawn with, although with all these VOCs I'd be hesitant to use it on food plants.

Thank you Dave- seems like it would be different, by just diluting the contaminants. Less water films I’m guessing.

I monitor the CO2 levels in my house and don’t worry about it until it’s over 900 ppm. Do you actually feel there is a risk of the outside air going above 800ppm. That would definitely be crazy. I wonder how CO2 levels are distributed outside. What is the ground level CO2 vs 1km up.

@@ecospider5 Check the reports about how much carbon is currently locked up in permafrost in the arctic. It's actively collapsing now, and there's nothing we can do to stop it collapsing so yes, it is all going to end up in the atmosphere. Geological processes will remove it eventually, but that's a very slow time scale. Also, I'm not a fan of 900ppm. 1000 is where people start being *consciously* aware of CO2 affecting them, and a 10% margin below that isn't much. There isn't any really detailed research on what is the optimal level for human health, but for 99% of human existence the air we were breathing was below 400ppm. I think that needs to be our target for indoor air quality for our families, and that means even today we need active decarbonation of our indoor air.

OMG There’s a huge amount of carbon stored in permafrost - an estimated 1,500 gigatons, or twice as much as the atmosphere contains. That was the first line from this MIT article. That’s crazy. Thanks for the search suggestion. climate.mit.edu/explainers/permafrost#:~:text=As%20permafrost%20thaws%2C%20bacteria%20can,loop%20that%20thaws%20more%20permafrost.

I have learned it’s impossible to sleep in a closed room and not have the Co2 go above 700ppm even with reasonable hvac. So I have a monitor that triggers at 700ppm. Turn on the hvac circulating fan, opens the outside air intake, and turns on the bathroom exhaust fan. It runs a lot. At thanksgiving we have 26 people. So I used them as lab rats without telling them. When the Co2 hit 1500ppm the conversation greatly reduced. So along with the HVAC I opened a window. When the Co2 dropped below 1000ppm the condensation went back up. It was kind of funny playing with the group. 🤓

@ecospider5 are you Bob?

And apparently FULL of PFAS too- that water is toxic garbage, don’t use for gardening.

Thanks for mentioning that a couple times. I have moved the tube so it goes down the drain instead of onto our plants.

Of?

Keep watching Mark, we’ll get there

@@HomePerformance I will, and I’ll keep the faith, but I think the breadth, importance and complexity of this topic would make the biohacker community blush.