The International WELL Building Institute announced the formation of the Air & Thermal Comfort Concepts Advisory. The goal of the advisory is to explore, better understand and, ultimately, more accurately quantify the impact of air quality and thermal comfort on human health and wellness.

The newly launched WELL Air & Thermal Comfort Concepts Advisory for 2018-19 presently includes:

• Tim Beuker, WELL AP, indoor environmental consultant, BBA Indoor Environmental Consultancy (Netherlands)

• Sandra Dedesko, sustainability consultant, RWDI (Canada)

•Ihab Elzeyadi, professor, University of Oregon (Eugene, Ore.)

 • Anjanette Green, LEED AP, USGBC IAQ WG, LFA, LBC Auditor, LPC Assessor, Declare 3PV, RESET Air AP & Senior Fellow, Fitwel Ambassador, director, standards development, RESET, GIGA (U.S./China)

• Dusan Licina, assistant professor, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (Switzerland)

• Jiannan Luo, CEng MCIBSE, WELL AP, LEED AP (BD+C) and BREEAM International Assessor, senior environmental design analyst, Foster + Partners (United Kingdom);

• Jovan Pantelic, assistant professional researcher, University of California Berkeley (Berkeley, Calif.)

• Badri Patel, EIT, BEAP, LEED AP (BD+C), WELL AP, VRF product specialist, Johnson Controls (Canada)

• Clare Parry, director, Grun Consulting (Australia)

• Christopher Schaffner, P.E., LEED Fellow, WELL AP, president, The Green Engineer Inc. (Concord, Mass.)

• Stefano Schiavon, PhD, associate professor, University of California, Berkeley (Berkeley, Calif.)

• Pawel Wargocki, PhD, Member ASHRAE, Member ISIAQ, secretary Academy of Indoor Air Sciences, associate professor, Technical University of Denmark.

• Nathan Stodola is the IWBI Air & Thermal Comfort concepts staff lead.

The WELL Air & Thermal Comfort Concepts Advisory is an all-volunteer body of practitioners, advocates, and experts who will assist IWBI in the ongoing evolution of WELL as it pertains to the concepts of air and thermal comfort and their impact on human health in new and existing buildings and living/work spaces around the world. It is one of nine such global advisories launched this month by the organization. The others cover additional concepts that, through scientific evidence, have been shown to impact human health: water, nourishment, light, movement, materials, sound, mind, and community. Concept advisory volunteers will serve a term of at least one year each.

“Engaging this esteemed body of experts advances not just our commitment to measuring and standardizing different aspects of a building’s impact on human health and wellness, but also broadens and deepens our understanding of the role variables like air quality and thermal comfort can play in helping people thrive,” said IWBI President Rachel Gutter.

The WELL Building Standard, which launched in 2014, is a tool that focuses exclusively on the impacts of buildings on human health and wellness. In May 2018, IWBI launched WELL v2, building on the collective learnings from nearly 1,000 projects using WELL, and incorporating the latest research, new technology, and advanced building practice.

For more information, visit www.wellcertified.org.