PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF A NEW METHOD FOR THE ASSESSMENT OF COMFORT, HEALTH AND PRODUCTIVITY IN OFFICES

In present-day society, people spend 90 % of their time in enclosed spaces, 30-40 % in offices. Due to building regulations and requirements for labelling policies, the modern office building is seen as an “efficient machine”, and energy consumption is becoming a central issue in the current architectural debate. However, also occupants ’ perception of indoor environmental quality (IEQ) should be verified. Therefore, new strategies for long-term building monitoring are required, focusing on human requirements and responses. The present study describes a methodology (RPM = Remote Performance Measurement) to evaluate IEQ (measured and perceived) and its effects on comfort and performance in intervention studies in real buildings. The procedure comprises measurements of environmental parameters and completion by occupants of on-line questionnaires. Performance is assessed by a new method that uses simulated office tasks. Questionnaires and tasks are administered via a standard internet web browser? The main objective of the research is the implementation and the validation of the method in field experiments. Thus, it was applied during the summer of 2004, in a case-control intervention study in a real office building, situated in Northern Italy. Measurements were carried out and questionnaires and performance tasks were completed prior to and after controlled modifications of specific HVAC system parameters, which affected thermal environment and IAQ