Abate: A lot of indoor air quality was taken for granted pre-COVID because it's clear and invisible. It's something that most people don't consider to be a threat to them. But then we learn that there's stuff in the air that can definitely affect you. I'd liken it to right have the 9/11 tragedy and how security people reacted.

What is this building doing to protect the air I breathe? Is the air I breathe something to be concerned about? We're seeing a drive towards many more buildings and even homeowners or consumers buying air quality models. They really want to know what's going on and what they breathe. The education about how what you breathe impacts your health has increased manyfold since the pandemic.

ACHR NEWS: Let's shift to Los Angeles. I want to focus on commercial buildings. How much smoke is in these buildings?

Abate: Sure. The one thing about a wildfire, especially to the magnitude that the Los Angeles area had, is the air quality by the fire itself. But also think about after the fire. Fire produces damage. Ash is a very small, light, fine particle. Any kind of wind or any kind of activity throws it back into the air. That air can be affected for up to two years after the incident by just these fine particles that are just very difficult to collect. They travel really well.

When there's a wildfire the air quality is going to be harmed for quite some time. They're really going to need to be aware of how to manage their indoor air quality so that they're not affected by the bad outdoor air quality.

ACHR NEWS: What's the solution to get that smoke out of the building?

Abate: That can be challenging. The first thing to know is that no building is airtight. You can't just seal the building up so well that the smoke doesn't get in. A certain amount will get in. One thing you want to do is try to minimize that.

So typically, buildings are mechanically ventilated. They don't have operable windows for the most part, and that mechanical system brings in a certain percentage of outdoor air mixed in with the air that gets recirculated. Those are controlled by damper motors. These louvers can open and close and are maybe on the side of the building or maybe on the roof. In many buildings, these louvers may not operate correctly. Or they may be old and they don't seal very well. Some have rubber flaps that are supposed to seal. Rubber gets hard and it gets worn. It doesn't do what it's supposed to do.

The first thing you'd want to know is do my dampers work correctly and if can I seal off the outside air when I need to. I think the first thing a building operator should do is make sure those dampers are correctly operating as they should. That means you're going to want to close them. When do you want to open and close them? What can really assist you in this is knowing the outdoor air quality. You can easily go to a government service called AirNow.gov and that will give you the outdoor air quality forecast.

In addition to that, you want to clean what comes in because you can't keep it all out. The three most critical factors to improving air indoor air quality are source control, ventilation, and air quality. Each of those three pillars are really very important.

Any building system that is to clean air is very dependent upon your ventilation capabilities. You want to know that your air is balanced and that it's being delivered correctly to all the spaces. You want to know your filters are good. You want to try to have the most efficient filter that your air system will allow for. And why I say that is people are probably familiar with HEPA filters. Rate filters can filter out over 99% of the small particles that come past them. But the problem in a typical building is they restrict airflow so much that they're not practical. You can't really use them. Most buildings probably have the capability of using a filter that's rated at what we call MERV 13, minimum efficiency reporting value. That's a really good filter for capturing particulate.

ACHR NEWS: In the commercial building environment, is this more the responsibility of the HVAC contractor to bring this up or the engineer?

Abate: I think both working together is typically the way this happens. Many HVAC contractors may not be aware of indoor air quality solutions, whereas some engineers might have become aware of them through time. The engineer is important because if you're going to do anything with the ventilation system or with the filtering system, the engineer has to be involved to be sure that the air balance is kept correctly and that the pressurization is kept correctly. You need to be aware that making a change can actually negatively impact the building. It's important that the building engineers are involved. But the same time, HVAC contractors should be aware of different solutions on the market that can help buildings because the building operator may not be aware of these things. Sometimes, as a well-educated HVAC contractor, you can bring these solutions to your customers.