`Unintended Consequences' Shape Indoor Air Quality.

IAQ is a thorny problem for managers

Energy conservation measures instituted in response to the energy crisis of the 1970s have been blamed for poor indoor air quality (IAQ), sick-building syndrome (SBS), and building-related illness (BRI), but is it really as simple as that? And if conservation is the cause, does it follow that improved IAQ must come at the cost of energy efficiency? Or can we have both?

Energy managers must deal with many intangibles. Has anyone ever seen electricity flowing through a circuit, for example? We know it's real, and we know how it behaves, but no one can claim to ever have seen it. Indoor air quality is the granddaddy of intangibles with which managers must contend. Like electricity, no one has seen it, but unlike electricity, no one agrees exactly what it is, how to achieve it, nor exactly how it behaves-but just about …