Indoor Air Quality

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The war on germs is on, and RGF Environmental Group Inc. is dominating the fight. The company rolled into the 2018 AHR Expo alongside the Germinator — a large, army-like vehicle, equipped with a giant REME HALO® mounted to the roof, which makes it capable of eliminating pollutants everywhere it goes.

There seem to be fewer family-owned mechanical companies every year, especially in the South where fast a/c service is king, and competition is as fierce as anywhere in the country.

Schools, colleges, and universities are a familiar and valuable market for HVAC contractors. These institutions typically combine a large amount of square footage with a high percentage of building ownership, which often means a willingness to invest for the long term.

A question I’m frequently asked is, where do you start when improving a poorly performing duct system? Do you tear it out and start over again, or is there an easier way? The good news is, there is a simple, logical pattern you can follow to optimize a duct system.

There is an epidemic in our industry of contractors trying to cram too much air through a filter that can’t handle it. It’s common to hear stories of 5-ton equipment trying to pull all its return air through a 16-by-25-by-1-inch pleated filter.

IAQ problems don’t exist just in homes. In fact, there is an increasing awareness about the importance of IAQ among not only commercial building owners and facility managers but also non-industry professionals as well.

On average, Americans spend over 90 percent of their time indoors where concentrations of some pollutants can be two to five times higher than typical outdoor concentrations, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Indoor air quality (IAQ) is a tricky thing. Numerous studies and papers on the topic have been published over the years, so benefits of good IAQ in buildings are well known — healthier, more productive workers. However, the symptoms related to poor IAQ can be mistaken for symptoms of other illnesses, such as allergies, stress, colds, and the flu.