The Spatial Distribution of Pollutant Transport to Indoor Surfaces

Abstract

Spatial distributions in surface flux and concentrations complicate the assessment of indoor mass-transfer coefficients and can bias the resulting estimates of indoor exposure. to better understand these phenomena, we quantify the spatial distribution of ozone flux and mass-transfer coefficients for indoor surfaces in several field locations using NaNO2 coated filters. the 12-h average transport-limited deposition velocity for ozone, Click to view the MathML source, corrected for the diameter of the filters, ranged from 1.2 m h−1 on a wall to 18.7 m h−1 near an operating recirculation supply vent in an apartment. For 10 filters distributed evenly around walls of a laboratory, large multi-person office, apartment with recirculation on (excluding a near-supply vent sample) and apartment with recirculation off, the average Click to view the MathML source were respectively, 3.3±1.1, 3.5±1.3, 2.8±0.8 and 2.3±0.8 m h−1. We observed (1) a tighter distribution of flux for filters placed near one-another than for filters separated by greater than one meter, (2) higher fluxes near sources of air movement such as supply vents and computers, and (3) consistent results in a single location over 5 days. Measurements obtained with devices such as coated filters can be corrected for size by using a range of device sizes during an experiment. We find the mass-transfer coefficient in a room-sized laboratory chamber to be proportional to the device diameter raised to the power of −0.45.

Department(s)

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering

Sponsor(s)

National Science Foundation (U.S.)

Keywords and Phrases

Deposition Velocity; Indoor Air; Mass-Transfer; Pollutant Deposition; Pollutant Transport; Spatial Measurement

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

1352-2310

Document Type

Article - Journal

Document Version

Citation

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2006 Elsevier, All rights reserved.

Publication Date

01 Jan 2006

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