Indoor air quality can impact staff happiness and business costs

The Cyprus University of Technology (Tepak) this week announced its participation in the SIEQUA-CERT project, which focuses on indoor environment quality, something which can affect employee satisfaction and have an impact on business costs.

The SIEQUA-CERT project, which stands for real-time monitoring and actionable decision support for sustainable indoor environment quality certification, has been selected for funding by the Research and Innovation Foundation (Idek) under the CO-DEVELOP programme.

The project officially kicked off on January 1, 2023, and has a total duration of 24 months.

According to an announcement by the university, the general objective of the SIEQUA-CERT project is the development of real-time Indoor Environment Quality (IEQ) health-impact metrics per building zone and an Indoor Environment and Health Awareness Decision Support System (DSS).

This is expected to generate measurable added value to support stakeholders in high-occupancy public and private buildings.

With one of the primary objectives being the creation and implementation of active solutions for monitoring indoor environment quality (IEQ), the decision support system will seek to provide automated suggestions for potential improvements within buildings, which can lead to a number of benefits for both its occupants and owners.

These include increased employee performance and satisfaction, reduced risk of transmission and viability of airborne viruses, reduced heating and cooling costs, and the overall optimisation of how resources are being used.

What is more, the university highlighted the importance of generating actionable insights in terms of the indoor environment’s impact on the occupants’ health.

The SIEQUA-CERT project is coordinated by PHOEBE Research and Innovation Ltd.

The interdisciplinary consortium also includes LELANTUS Innovations Ltd, the KIOS Research and Innovation Center of Excellence of the University of Cyprus, the Cyprus Sustainable Tourism Initiative, and two research teams from the Cyprus University of Technology (Tepak): the Cyprus International Institute for Environmental and Public Health (CII) and the Department of Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering and Informatics (EECEI).

The leader of the Tepakteam is Konstantinos Makris, Associate Professor from the CII.

Other members of the CII team include Corina Konstantinou, PhD candidate; Pantelis Charisiadis, Postdoctoral Fellow; and Christina Xeni, Research Fellow.

Regarding the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering and Informatics, the second Tepak team comprises Michalis Michaelides, Assistant Professor; and Christina Kakoulli, PhD candidate.

“The contribution of the two Tepak teams is mainly focusing on literature review, acquisition of questionnaire data with respect to environmental and health parameters in indoor environments, as well as refinement and transfer of algorithms and intellectual property for the capturing of virus transmissibility indexes in indoor environments,” the university said.

“The developed system can be used by owners and operators of large high occupancy buildings, enabling them to identify problems and take corrective actions,” the statement concluded.