Indoor-to-outdoor pollutant concentration ratio modeling of CO2, NO2, and lung-deposited nanoparticles

Özet

Knowledge of the levels of pollutants to which the occupants of a residential home are exposed isimportant, because of the potential adverse effect of the pollutants on the occupants' health. This studypresents the first indoor-to-outdoor ratio (IOR) prediction models for CO2, NO2, and the lung-depositednanoparticles (defined as particulate matters of 10e1000 nm in diameter). The IORs of CO2, NO2, and thelung-deposited nanoparticles (LDN) were measured in 20 residential homes in Seoul, South Korea, andmeteorological information, building characteristics, and information relating to occupants' indoor activitieswere collected as predictor candidates. A correlation analysis and a multistep multivariate linearregression analysis were performed to develop the IOR models. Based on the analysis, the selected predictorsof the IOR for a home are the number of occupants, the type of stove, and the number of cookingactivities for CO2, the temperature and number of cooking activities for NO2, and the number of occupantsand floor level on which the home is located for LDN. The accuracies of the models were examined in termsof R2, and were found to be 0.70, 0.54, and 0.79 for CO2, NO2, and LDN models, respectively.