Are Your Sick of Your Home? An investigation into Sick Building Syndrome (SBS)

Tired all the time?  Suffer from headaches?  Can’t sleep or find it difficult to concentrate? Was it the dodgy prawn you ate or the gin in last night’s tonic?  Perhaps it’s a bad allergy attack, the onset of asthma or worse?

Well here’s another suggestion. Maybe your home, the place where you feel most comfortable and secure, is making you sick.  Seriously!  Sick building syndrome (SBS) has been recognized by the World Health Organization and has been an official disease since 1986.

Can I detect a doubtful raised eyebrow?  Let me explain.  As building techniques have improved over the last century we have eliminated draughts. And we’ve been pretty good at it.  Doors and windows are pretty much sealed and whether you live in a modern penthouse or an old cottage, the chances are your home is pretty airtight.  All well and good, yes?  Well here’s the difficulty – we’ve filled our homes full of toxic substances and synthetic fibres that are about as welcome as a fart in a space suit.

What is Sick Building Syndrome (SBS)?

SBS is a generic term covering a whole range of symptoms.  People react differently to specific conditions, and although symptoms vary with time and location they can include:

• Lethargy
• Dry or watery eyes
• Headache
• Loss of concentration
• Throat problems
• Nasal irritation
• Skin irritation

What causes Sick Building Syndrome (SBS)?

According to the World Health Organization up to 30% of refurbished and a significant number of new buildings can cause SBS.  Essentially, unless you’ve been very careful and deliberate about how you built your home and how you manage its internal environment, the air inside could contain all sorts of nasty things.  These include toxins from paint, glue, insulation, preservatives, or varnishes, and things such as respiration particles, mould, dust mite poo, microbes, bacteria, viruses, animal dander, pollen, volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and more!  The Environmental Protection Agency has found that indoor air can be as much as ten times more polluted than the outside air!

OK, Enough of the Diagnosis… How Do I Make My Home Healthy?

1_Ventilation in a Healthy Building

This isn’t a matter of simply opening the windows – if you do that you let the outside in. You might as well go camping!  A far better solution is to use a ‘mechanical ventilation and heat exchange system’.  This complicated-sounding, yet fairly simple device will filter the air inside your home to 99.98% purity.  It replaces impure air from inside your house with filtered air brought in from outside, and in doing so retains 95% of the heat energy held within that air.

In order to work to its full potential, such a system relies on your building being completely sealed (we’re talking doors, windows, walls, roofs, floors and everything in between).  From an efficiency point of view this is essential.  Also, it’s important that this kind of technology is installed by an expert so that it can’t harbour any of the alien particles and bacteria you’re trying to eliminate.

2_Plants in a Healthy Building

Plants are nature’s air purifiers – we breathe oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, whilst plants breathe carbon dioxide and emit oxygen: a pretty neat symbiosis. Psychologists tell us plants make us feel calm and peaceful, and they may or may not be right, but what we do know is that the human species didn’t evolve in a Formica kitchen so a few plants might at least make us feel more at home!

3_Noise in a Healthy Building

I live in Spain with my wife and two small children.  Personally speaking, I believe it’s really important to live in a quiet and calm space.

According to official statistics, Spain has the world’s second highest level of noise pollution after Japan (see http://www.menosruido.com/menu.htm for more information), and this has adverse affects on the population’s health and quality of life.  What’s more, Spain had (until recently) the lowest required level of minimum acoustic insulation in all of Europe.  Only this year has it increased from 42 to 50 decibels.  For this reason, in most apartment blocks in Spain you soon become well acquainted with the most intimate habits of your neighbours – although you can’t see what they’re up to you can certainly hear it!

So maybe you can see why I feel strongly that noise insulation is a key requirement in a healthy building.  Quiet and peaceful is healthy.  Loud and noisy is disturbing and stressful.

In terms of materials, whilst cement and steel carry noise very effectively, timber does not. Nearly all materials that insulate well against heat loss insulate well against noise. When you are planning your home and your life you should also think about the hum of machinery such as air conditioning or any continuous background noise which you might encounter.

4_Natural Light in a Healthy Building

Natural light is best.  There have been plenty of studies on topics such as the performance of sales staff under different lighting conditions, which have all helped to prove the health benefits of natural light.  Florescent lights are commonly found in offices, but often have insufficient illumination, a lack of contrast and a tendency to flicker, all of which can result in problems like overly strained eyes and headaches.  What’s more, a lack of natural sunlight can cause depression, anxiety, fatigue and seasonal affective disorder (SAD).

All sounds pretty depressing!  Not to worry though, there are many ingenious ways to get natural light into even the most awkward parts of a building.  These include light wells, light chimneys using mirrors systems, and clever skylights which track the sun through the day.  If you are planning a new build, think hard about internal layout, orientation and window placement to make the best use of the natural light available to us all.

5_Hard Floors in a Healthy Building

Carpets are nice looking, warm underfoot and make your home look expensive, but did you know they can hold up to eight times their weight in dirt?  This dirt can harbour dust mites, dust particles and all sort of other nasties, including things that have been linked to respiratory diseases, nose and eye problems to name but a few.

There is, however, a wide range of hard flooring available, all of which is easy to keep clean, not to mention the fact that they look great and can be made to be just as warm as carpets.  I’m not saying never buy a carpet again, but it’s interesting to know that there are excellent alternatives available.

And Finally…

As you can see, there are potential problems and pitfalls everywhere you look: from the fabric of the building right down to the objects you fill it with.  The key is to be aware, and if possible get reliable advice from qualified professionals with integrity, not the sort of people who will sell you anything they can just to take your money. It’s a bit like visiting your doctor or your garage mechanic – find someone you trust and take their advice.

This article was written jointly by John Wolfendale and Simon Thorpe.

John Wolfendale is a director of Eco Vida. Simon Thorpe is a third year architecture undergraduate at Magdalene Cambridge. At the time of writing he is on an internship with Eco Vida. simoncthorpe@hotmail.co.uk