Development of a procedure for estimating the parameters of mechanistic VOC emission source models from chamber testing data

In order to evaluate the impacts of volatile organic compounds(VOCs)emissions from building materials on the indoor air quality beyond the standard chamber test conditions and test period,mechanistic emission source models have been developed in the past.However,very limited data are available for the required model parameters including the initial concentration(C_(m0)),in-material diffusion coefficient(D_(m)),partition coefficient(Kma),and convective mass transfer coefficient(k_(m)).In this study,a procedure was developed for estimating the model parameters by using VOC emission data from standard small chamber tests.In the procedure,initial values of the model parameters were refined by multivariate regression analysis of the measured emission data.To verify the procedure and estimate its uncertainty,simulated chamber test data were generated by adding 10% experimental uncertainties on the theoretical curve from the analytical solution to a mechanistic emission model.Then the procedure was applied to the generated data to estimate the model parameters.Results indicated that estimates converged to the original parameter values used for the data generation and the error of estimated parameters D_(m1)C_(m0) and K_(ma) were within±10%,±23%,and±25%of the true values,respectively.The procedure was further demonstrated by applying it to estimate the model parameters from real chamber test data.Wide application of the procedure would result in a database of mechanistic source model parameters for assessing the impact of VOC emissions on indoor pollution load,which are essential input data for evaluating the effectiveness of various indoor air quality(IAQ)design and control strategies as well as the energy required for meeting given IAQ requirements.

Vapor intrusion in buildings: Development of semi-empirical models including lateral separation between the building and the pollution source

Future constructions in the context of the industrial wastelands reuse may be exposed to Vapor Intrusion(VI).VI can be evaluated by combining in-situ measures and analytical models to evaluate exposure risk in future indoor environments.However,the assumptions in the existing models may reduce their accuracy when they do not meet the characteristics of real situations.Wrong estimations of indoor concentration levels may lead to inappropriate solutions against VI.In this context,new semi-empirical models(SEM)are proposed in order to better specify pollution scenarios and thus increase the accuracy of VI estimations.This development is based on a parametric study(numerical CFD)and a dimensionless analysis combined to existing VI models that consider a continuous source distribution in the soil.These expressions allow to better take into account the source position in the soil(i.e.depth and lateral source/building separation),soil properties(air permeability,diffusion coefficient of the pollutant,…)and building features(building foundation,indoor pressure,air exchange rate,…)in the estimation of indoor concentration levels.The obtained results with the proposed SEM were compared with a numerical CFD model and available experimental data,showing good accuracy in the estimation of VI.Given the advantages of these new models,they can provide better precision in the health risk assessments associated with VI.Furthermore,these expressions can be easily integrated into building ventilation codes allowing to consider air exchange rate and indoor pressure variations over time.