Is the Air in Your Home Affecting your Family’s Health?

When you hear the phrase “air pollution” what do you think of? Before I became involved at 4CORE, I often thought of cities filled with smog from car exhaust, power plants and manufacturing. You can guess my surprise when I learned that the air inside our  homes, schools and businesses can be two to five times more polluted than the air outside. When the average American spends 90% of their time indoors and 50% of their time inside their homes, indoor air pollution becomes a much larger public health problem than most people imagine.

The most common indoor air pollutants include mold and moisture, combustion sources and secondhand smoke, building materials and furniture, household cleaning products and paints, and outdoor sources such as radon and pesticides. In the short-term, people may experience asthma and allergies symptoms, eye, nose and throat irritation, headaches and dizziness. In the long-term, exposure to indoor air pollution can cause lung and heart disease and cancer.

4CORE (myself included) became concerned about the issue of healthy homes while managing the low-income Weatherization program. Eighty percent of homes we weatherized in Southwest Colorado had health and safety problems, which could have been prevented with proper education on cleaning, maintenance, and ventilation. In 2013 as the Weatherization Client Services Coordinator I attended a conference discussing the overlap of Healthy Homes and Weatherization. I was shocked to learn the numbers of low income children who developed asthma from the homes they lived in, which in some cases was made worse by tightening up their homes for energy efficiency. I learned that we don't have to choose and that good air quality and energy efficiency can go together.

In August 2013, wereceived an Environmental Justice Small grant from the EPA to educate low income families about indoor air quality in La Plata County. In the past year I was able to lead 19 educational workshops across the county and reached 352 participants.

Healthy Homes workshop participants improved the health of their homes by using the free carbon monoxide detectors, radon test kits, Healthy Homes Pledges, resources and information. One participant reported, "Our neighbors, who have a young baby, almost got carbon monoxide poisoning from a dryer venting problem - I loaned them the carbon monoxide detector that we received from the workshop and when they were able to see their dangerously high CO level they moved out of the house since the landlord wouldn't fix the problem."

4CORE also partnered with CSU Extension on a radon education program, sponsored by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to hand out short term radon test kits to workshop participants and perform 25 continuous radon tests. One workshop participant said, "The radon test has prompted me to take action. I plan to retest and contact a radon mitigation contractor."

On August 19th 4CORE and CSU Extension will be hosting a community celebration of healthy homes and radon awareness from 11 am - 1:30 pm at the La Plata County Fairgrounds. I invite you to attend this free event which will showcase successes of the programs, discuss current resources and next steps towards improving indoor air quality in La Plata County with local leaders and staff from the EPA and CDPHE. Lunch and carbon monoxide detectors will be provided. I'd love to have you join us!

Please RSVP 

For me personally it has been a wonderful experience working at 4CORE for the past three and a half years in the Weatherization, HomeRx, Radon and Healthy Homes programs. I will be sad to leave when our Healthy Homes EPA grant concludes at the end of the month. I have learned so much about healthy housing, energy efficiency, and alternative technologies in our community to say nothing of the nonprofit skills I've gained. The most meaningful part of my work has been the relationships built with clients and families and the feeling that despite everything else happening in their lives I may be able to help, just a bit, in making their homes warmer, healthier or more affordable.

I hope you join me on August 19th to celebrate the conclusion of the Healthy Homes program. See you there!

About the Author

Sandhya Tillotson is Executive Director of The Garden Project of Southwest Colorado, as well as the Healthy Homes Program Specialist at 4CORE. Originally from California, Sandhya earned her Bachelor's degree in Environmental Science from The Colorado College in Colorado Springs. After moving to Durango in 2010, Sandhya is thrilled to be working for a local environmental non-profit and spending her free time volunteering, running, biking, climbing and exploring the vast wilderness that makes up Durango's backyard.

How Much Fresh Air is Enough and Who Decides?

My assessment of adequate indoor air quality is when you can move from indoors to outdoors, or outdoors to indoors, and air inside feels as fresh as it does outside. My recommendation for assessing your home’s indoor air quality is to NOT do the math and rate to standards, but to take a deep breath inside your home. Before you forget how it feels, walk outdoors and take another deep breath of fresh outdoor air. Does it feel different? Does the outdoor air make you feel better? The air you prefer to breathe is the air you should be breathing.

Why Does Indoor Air Quality Matter?
Familiarize yourself with problems caused by poor indoor air quality. There is a good article by James Hamblin that appeared in “The Atlantic” in March of 2014 titled “The Toxins That Threaten Our Brains.” We also have a lot of great resources at our website.

If there is one idea I would like to be able convey to readers it is that like temperature, fresh air introduction and indoor air quality exists as a range. That range can be from bad to good, and it can be changed to suit the occupants’ preference, comfort, and health needs.

Below are two standards for indoor air quality.One standard strives toward “A High Level of Comfort,” the other to not dissatisfy the majority of occupants. One strives to not cause or aggravate illness, the other recommends reducing the likelihood of health risk.

Standard 1
“Acceptable indoor air quality: air toward which a substantial majority of occupants express no dissatisfaction with respect to odor and sensory irritation and in which there are not likely to be contaminants at concentrations that are known to pose a health risk.”

Standard 1 is part of the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) standard “62.2-2013 Ventilation and Acceptable Indoor Air Quality in Low-Rise Residential Buildings”. This is the guiding standard for home indoor air quality in the US and is likely the standard that was used for your home if it was built in the last few years. It states, “While acceptable IAQ is the goal of this standard, it will not necessarily be achieved even if all requirements are met.” This doesn't exude confidence in a standard that is not very demanding to begin with.

ASHRAE has calculations and tables for calculating the ventilation rate for a given residential configuration, but they are not available to the general public (at least not for free). Remember that installed equipment and systems often do not deliver at their intended capacity. For example, it is not unusual for a fan rated to move 100 cubic feet per minute of air to only deliver a small percentage of this volume.

If it were easier to assess health risks from long term exposure to indoor pollution I believe that ASHRAE would have a whole different set of recommendations. Energy savings are pretty easy to assess, while the correlation of health problems to long term exposure to indoor pollutants has so far been impossible to prove.

Standard 2
Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) can be defined as: the physical, chemical and biological properties that indoor air must have, in order:

• not to cause or aggravate illnesses in the building occupants, and
• to secure a high level of comfort to the building occupants in the performance of the designated activities for which the building has been intended and designed.

Standard 2 is from the International Society of Indoor Air Quality and Climate (ISIAQ). It is from the ISIAQ’s, “Performance Criteria of Buildings for Health and Comfort.” I like this standard better because it strives for a healthier environment.

While my recommendation will not likely end up being the new standard for building code, I do have my own ideas on the topic. I like the 0.5 air exchanges per hour that is the standard in a number of European countries. I like this number because I believe it is a good starting place for fresh air introduction. From the 0.5 air exchanges per hour, the homeowner can regulate fresh air introduction to a level that makes sense both in comfort and in utility cost (there is a cost to heating and cooling fresh air).

When I first started working in my present office, the indoor air quality was lousy. My office is now ventilated at the 0.5 air exchanges per hour rate. When I walk out of the building at the end of the day the difference in breathing outdoors is negligible. In case you missed it, my assessment of adequate indoor air quality is when you can move from indoors to outdoors, or outdoors to indoors, and the difference in air quality is negligible.

In my home the difference is negligible during temperate and warmer months, but more noticeable in the middle of the winter. We sacrifice some indoor air quality for lower heating bills during the winter, and boost our fresh air intake as much as possible when it is more affordable.

My recommendation for assessing your home’s indoor air quality is to NOT do the math, and to remember that even if you knew how much fresh air was being introduced into your home, the design amount was to meet building code, which is the minimum. Instead, take a deep breath inside your home. Before you forget how it feels, walk outdoors and take another deep breath of fresh outdoor air. Does it feel different? Does the outdoor air make you feel better? The air you prefer to breathe is the air you should be breathing.

About the author
David Davis is a Certified Energy Manager, and product designer for the Fresh Air Manufacturing Company. Among experience leading to this role was five years as a utility efficiency expert, five years as an HVAC instructor for Boise State University, and a number of earlier years as an Engineering Specialist for Siemens and Honeywell. Learn more about fresh air here.

4CORE brings Healthy Homes Grant to La Plata County

4CORE is launching the Healthy Homes Project to increase community awareness of public health issues related to residential indoor air pollution. The goal is to share low- or no-cost methods for reducing indoor air pollution health risks for vulnerable populations, including low income families, children and the elderly.

4CORE received an Environmental Justice Grant from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to fund this effort in La Plata County. Throughout the next year the project will conduct 18 presentations across the county to provide information on topics such as asthma, radon, carbon monoxide poisoning, second-hand smoke and Sick Home Syndrome.

“The EPA says we spend an average of 80-90% of our time indoors and this air can be two- to five-times more polluted than air outdoors,” states Gregg Dubit, Executive Director of 4CORE. “We are excited to be able to provide this information to our region’s low-income populations, especially children and elderly people who are particularly at risk.”

A long-term goal of the project is to improve the health of program participants through improved indoor air quality in their homes as a result of information gained from presentations. Participants will receive free radon test kits, carbon monoxide alarms and information on low- or no-cost methods for the reduction of home-based health hazards.

Key partners in the project include: San Juan Basin Health Department, Housing Solutions for the Southwest and the Regional Housing Alliance. Interested community organizations, low-income housing developments and health providers are encouraged to contact 4CORE at 970-259-1916 to schedule a presentation.  For more information, visit www.fourcore.org.

True Story: Healthy Rental Home

Duct before and after cleaning

My landlady is a saint. Or at least, she has me convinced she is.

As an employee of 4CORE I know the dangers of radon and dirty furnace ducts, and as the mother of a one-year-old, I want to minimize the risks of poor indoor air quality to my family.

So when I brought the scary results of two radon tests (one done in February, one in May) to my landlady and asked her what could be done, she didn't bat an eye. She called up a radon mitigation company and ordered the work on our basement to take place within a month.

Similarly a few months later, my husband noticed a nasty black residue inside our ducts and told our landlady. She ordered work from a company that specializes in duct cleaning, and had her home serviced, as well. Now both furnaces are working more quietly, efficiently, there is no burnt smell from dust settling in the system over the summer, and I'm betting our bills will be reduced, too.

Saint or Savvy?
Is our landlady really a saint, or is she savvy by maintaining the value of her rental investment? Is she protecting our family's health because she loves the way my daughter waves and smiles at her, or does she realize that:

Unhealthy Indoor Air Quality + Taking Action = Doing the Right Thing

I'm betting on a bit of both - the canned pears she gave us last week would indicate she is a caring person, but she also owns a large ranch, a home in Silverton, and three homes in Durango and maintains all of them with an eye for a bargain and frugal spending.

Rental Property Owners: Food for Thought
If you own rental property, the first thing that might cross your mind is "I don't want to know if it has radon or a dirty HVAC system, because then I'll have to fix it."

However, there is a movement afoot in our region to educate home buyers (you probably won't hang on to your rental forever), and home renters too, about the dangers of unsafe air quality.

Why not do the right thing now and maintain your rental investment by ensuring a safe, clean Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning (HVAC) system, and gain peace of mind by testing your rental (and home!) for radon. A healthy and efficient home helps to ensure comfort for the occupant and the budget!

About the Author

Teresa Shishim is a Colorado native who is dedicated to improving where we live through collaboration. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Science at Western Washington University and has significant experience managing and coordinating projects and programs, including marketing campaigns, volunteer programs, and events. She gained this experience through a variety of positions, including serving as the Director of a non-profit river restoration group and as Marketing Manager for a start-up software company.

Teresa is the designated Community Energy Coordinator for Archuleta and San Juan Counties.

Test, fix, save a life - National Radon Action Month

There is much that we all do, at least in part, to maintain our health.  Eat right, exercise, shop organic, "green" our homes.  However, one of the most important things you can do for your health is little known and seldom discussed.  Radon is the number two cause of lung cancer next to smoking (and the leading cause of lung cancer for non-smokers). However, alarm bells are not going off as they should be for a health risk resulting in over 21,000 deaths annually. 

Watch this quick radon awareness video to hear of one man's personal struggle with radon-related lung cancer.

Possibly the lack of alarm and awareness about radon is because it is an invisible, colorless, odorless radioactive gas. It comes from the natural breakdown of uranium found in almost all soils.  Radon moves up through the ground and enters homes through cracks and other holes in the foundation, getting trapped in homes, leading to potentially dangerous levels.  The only way to know if you have radon in your home is to test.

This issue has not created a great deal of public outcry in our community, but it is not for a lack of effort.  Locally, Colorado State University Extension Office in conjunction with San Juan Basin Health Department has offered numerous radon awareness community presentations, giving out free kits to residents and sharing this map identifying radon levels in homes tested in the Durango/La Plata County region.

January is National Radon Action Month, and although we are well into the month, add this important item to the top of your New Year's resolution list.  Go to a presentation in your community, test your home, and know your number.  (For La Plata County, see this list of upcoming presentations.)

4CORE has applied for funding to become trained in radon testing and mitigation in order to better serve the clients whose homes we weatherize.  Together let's move this issue forward in our community, making it the high priority that it needs to be.

About the Author: Claire Ninde

After gaining valuable experience for five years in the for-profit world as Business Manager and Partner at a local public relations firm, Claire is thrilled to be back in the non-profit world as the Weatherization Leveraging Coordinator. Claire previously worked at two local non-profits and was involved in program administration, advocacy and fundraising.