Healthcare facility managers might be hard-pressed to identify what indoor air quality (IAQ), air conditioning overuse, insulation, daylighting, and patient recovery all have in common. The answer is glass-specifically, insulating glass used in windows, doors, and skylights.
In new construction and renovation, glass selection can either help or hinder solutions to the above problems and opportunities.
The heat inside a healthcare facility can exacerbate the problem of IAQ. Off-gassing of building components, furnishings, and equipment, and the occurrence of mold due to water leaks or humidity, will only become worse as indoor temperatures rise due to overheating.
According to mold mitigation advice offered by the California Department of Health Services' Indoor Air Quality Information Sheet, dated July 2001, turning up the heat or using heaters in confined areas actually increases the rate of mold growth. Also noteworthy, according to the heating and cooling Web site of structural improvement authority Bob Villa, is that “the rate at which formaldehyde is released (from building materials and products used indoors) is accelerated by heat.”
These high ambient temperatures inside a building are often caused by solar energy radiating through glass on the south and west sides of a facility, where the most intense sun exposure is found.
The conventional solution to reducing indoor temperatures and mitigating the impact of deteriorating IAQ is to use air conditioning (AC) more often. As a result, almost one out of every five kilowatt hours of electricity consumed in the United States is used to cool buildings, including hospitals and medical centers (Source: Alternet.org). In addition to consuming more energy and contributing to increased greenhouse gas emissions, much of today's conditioned air is literally going out the window. From 25% to 35% of the energy used in U.S. buildings is wasted due to poorly insulating glass (Source: United States Green Building Council), and even the performance of so-called “energy-efficient” low-emissivity (low-e) insulating glass pales in comparison to insulated walls and ceilings.
