Overall Rating Silver - expired
Overall Score 46.52
Liaison Sarah Wald
Submission Date Nov. 16, 2011
Executive Letter Download

STARS v1.1

Drew University
OP-3: Indoor Air Quality

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 2.00 / 2.00 Mark Ostapczuk
Director of Environmental Health & Safety
Facilities
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Occupied building space covered by an indoor air quality plan, policy, and/or practices that include regular auditing or monitoring and a mechanism for occupants to register complaints :
1,284,345 Square feet

Total occupied building space :
1,284,345 Square feet

A brief description of the institution's indoor air quality plan, policy, and/or practices:

All occupied spaces at Drew University are covered by the following process: Concerns are communicated to Facilities as part of a work order for other things like odd odors or suspected mold growth from water leaks, etc. Typically the investigation begins with a walk through of the area and a questionnaire is provided to the occupant(s) to try to narrow down health concerns, symptoms, and spatial relationships (i.e. when is the problem occurring). Once the potential for an air contaminant is identified as a potential source of a problem, then air sampling can be considered. However, unlike air contaminants found in an industrial setting generated from a specific process, there are few regulatory limits associated with most of the items of concern related to general indoor air quality. For example, the OSHA permissible exposure limit for carbon dioxide is 5000 ppm (parts per million) based on an 8 hour average. In a normal academic setting you would probably never see a measurement that high as typically the only source of carbon dioxide inside a building is from the products of normal human respiration (i.e. exhaled air). Taking a measurement in the morning and the evening in a particular location can show if there is a buildup of carbon dioxide throughout the day, therefore indicating if more outside air is needed in a particular space. This way the measurement of the air contaminant is more of a performance based assessment (i.e. performance of the ventilation system).


The website URL where information about the institution's indoor air quality initiatives is available:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
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The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.