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Recent trends in green building design and product selection focus on sustainable and energy-efficient materials and how they can impact and improve architectural performance and occupant experience. Both performance and occupant experience are extremely important when designing for interior spaces, where most people spend an estimated 90 percent of their time. Architects, designers, and builders as well as green building programs understand the importance of choosing the right products for the space. But there’s more to it than that.
Photo courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
Healthy interiors start with healthy products, such as certified sustainable ceiling and wall panels, as shown here at Brandstar corporate headquarters in Deerfield Beach, Florida.
This growing shift toward an emphasis on the health and well-being of occupants is now closely tied to sustainable building practices that use environmentally friendly materials and products, and in particular increased product ingredient transparency. Architects and designers have many options when it comes to specifying materials, and product transparency can help them make choices best suited to their project requirements.
The driving forces behind the trend include new ideas about how spaces are used, deliberate attention to how spaces impact the productivity and health of occupants, and increased transparency about product ingredients and related certifications. Together, these trends provide that architects, designers, specifiers, and building developers all have opportunities to rethink not only the products they use but also how to use them.
A Changing Workforce: The Role of The Millennial Generation
The millennial generation has had a huge impact on reshaping interior spaces in the workplace. Where previous generations relied on closed office spaces and cubicles, new workers emphasize the benefits of nontraditional, flexible workspaces that include anything from open-plan areas for collaboration to kitchens, lounges, and recreation areas. Workplaces specifically designed for open-plan, focus, or collaborative spaces can lead to unwanted noise, which is a leading factor in workplace dissatisfaction, and can reduce effectiveness and increase stress of building occupants.
Sustainable, Healthy Materials for Better Interior Spaces
In addition to a shift to more open interior design options, sustainability has become a true driving force with building design. Manufacturers, developers, architects, designers, and building owners all have a goal to create buildings that are energy efficient and sustainable, and that do more to improve the occupant health and well-being compared to more traditional designs. Balancing these sometimes competing priorities can be challenging at times with so much information available. Product transparency and third-party certifications help streamline relevant information in a way that makes the design process more manageable and helps architects be confident they’re choosing sustainable materials for their projects.
New Research on The Impact of The Indoor Environment
Where we previously relied on anecdotal evidence about the impact of interior lighting, air quality, and noise on occupant experience, we now have a growing body of scientific evidence that supports what people have known for a long time: indoor environments affect human health. From a designer’s perspective, this means that healthy interiors can positively impact occupant experience.
While the metrics and outcomes that show the level of impact that a well-designed space can have are still fairly new, researchers are beginning to quantify some of the things people often complain about in spaces, such as low light, poor air quality, and noise. For example, researchers at the Healthy Buildings program at Harvard’s Center for Climate, Health and Global Environment (C-CHANGE) focus on the concept of “building for health.” They have found that employees working in spaces with enhanced air quality and better ventilation can raise their cognitive function scores. Changes in lighting can help too; a blue-enriched light that mimics sunlight in an office space can improve an employee’s sleep quality overnight. The result is that employees can perform better at work and are better rested than those who work in poor indoor conditions. Both of these factors lead to increasing employee satisfaction and employee retention, which can translate into financial benefits for employers, and thus property owners.2
The challenge is that the upfront investments can be costly, and the return on investment (ROI) isn’t immediately apparent to potential building owners and property managers. But that view is starting to change. Many businesses and organizations are becoming increasingly aware that it takes more than just a “good job” and a positive work culture to hire and retain good employees. One of the most common shifts is a general understanding that well-designed workplaces and healthy environments have a tremendous impact on employee satisfaction, productivity, and ultimately retention. Evidence shows that employees who work in spaces that are light, bright, quiet, and thermally comfortable are more likely to perform better than those in spaces that are lacking those positive qualities. And performance is a metric that organizations can use as evidence of their investment. Businesses that recognize how important healthy workspaces are will be more likely to invest in new building designs and certified healthy and sustainable products to create better work environments. Buildings designed with the occupant experience and well-being in mind can make a huge difference in improving tenant and occupant satisfaction.
Source: Harvard University/United Technologies
Product Transparency and Certification
Product transparency and certifications help specifiers choose sustainable products that can improve occupant well-being and create better spaces.
Tools such as environmental product declarations (EPDs), health product declarations (HPDs), Declare, Cradle-to-Cradle (C2C), material safety and data sheets (MSDS), and life-cycle assessments (LCAs), for example, all can provide valuable information about the materials. EPDs, for example, quantify the environmental impact of a product, or even in a system, as seen in an LCA. The LCA may look at the product from cradle to grave or, increasingly, from cradle to cradle for materials that can be recycled or repurposed.1
The new AIA Healthier Materials Protocol was created to provide clear, practical methods and tools to navigate this maze and effectively translate awareness to practice. The document provides a stepwise method for setting healthier materials goal and criteria definitions, product selection, tracking, and specification, no matter the size and scope of the project. It also suggests tools and provides examples from case studies to assist with each step.
The user-friendly guide is written to meet you where you are as an architect or a firm and help you:
- select safer materials for humans and the environment
- design and build with healthier materials
- understand the differences between material transparency and chemical avoidance
- address barriers in obtaining buy-in from peers, clients, and the market
- collectively strengthen the market signal for safer alternative products
- Download Prescription for Healthier Building Materials: A Design and Implementation Protocol
Integrating sustainable materials into a building design starts with a shift in how specifiers think about and understand the space. This shift parallels an overall cultural shift toward wellness that is founded in evidence and relies heavily on having key stakeholders value wellness as a core element of the design. Healthier building design is an up-front investment that can reap significant rewards for building owners. Tenants, whether commercial or residential, are increasingly willing to pay a premium for buildings that are environmentally sustainable and that promote health and wellness.
Photo courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
Architects and designers can choose flexible design solutions that incorporate ceiling panels to enhance an interior space, as shown here at the University of New Hampshire School of Law in Concord, New Hampshire.
Healthy Buildings are a Healthy Investment
The idea that a healthy indoor environment is critical for occupant well-being is not new. However, specifiers and developers are now prioritizing occupant well-being and experience in their project designs. Factors such as enhanced air quality, better lighting, and noise control all contribute to creating more effective, flexible, and sustainable spaces. Owners are investing in sustainable building materials and design because they can improve building occupant satisfaction and overall performance, increasing the building value.
A recent survey of 200 Canadian building owners shows that 38 percent of those who reported identified that healthy buildings were worth at least 7 percent more than buildings without deliberate healthy design features. In terms of leasing, 46 percent of the owners noted that healthier buildings were easy to lease, and 28 percent of the owners claimed that these buildings commanded premium rents.6
According to an EPA-funded survey, the National Human Activity Pattern Survey (NHAPS): A Resource for Assessing Exposure to Environmental Pollutants, the average American spends 87 percent of his or her time indoors. Research on indoor exposure time helps scientists understand how people may be impacted by pollutants in common indoor environments, such as schools, offices, and health-care facilities.
Moreover, according to “Drive Toward Healthier Buildings 2016: Tactical Intelligence to Transform Building Design and Construction,” published by Dodge Data & Analytics, architects, interior designers, and contractors often underestimate how their clients value healthier buildings. For example, the report notes that 75 percent of the owners who responded said they want to improve employee and tenant satisfaction with healthier buildings, but only 68 percent of architects, 51 percent of contractors, and 41 percent of interior designers see this as a priority for their clients. In addition, 78 percent of the owners have identified the impact of their investments.3 Even just these few initial statistics show that there is an excellent opportunity for building professionals to begin modifying their practices and building partnerships with public health professionals who can help increase awareness about the benefits of green building design and continue to provide research in the area.
Source: Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
For years, research has shown that providing improved air quality, strategic use of daylighting, and designing allows building professionals to improve occupant well-being. These design strategies have been used widely to improve the building occupant experience, whether to enhance learning and attentiveness in schools, increase effectiveness in office spaces, or improve the recovery rates in hospitals and health-care buildings.
Design and Construction Decisions for Occupant Well-Being
Building owners and professionals have the challenge of balancing numerous priorities when it comes to design and construction decisions. Owners, for example, need to articulate their values for the future occupant experience and understand how those values translate into upfront costs. On the other hand, architects and designers need to balance aesthetics, performance, and code compliance in their designs. Considerations need to be made in choosing materials and creating product specifications that consider all priorities, as well as project timeline and budget.
The major factors that influence design and construction decisions include cost, building aesthetics, energy performance, and occupant well-being. In the recent Dodge Report, owners, architects, and contractors ranked design and construction cost savings as the most important factors influencing design and construction decisions. Owners also highly valued operating costs as a close second, and aesthetics followed as a close second for architects. Interior designers, on the other hand, leaned more toward aesthetics and occupant health and well-being, and thus for healthier building features.
Ultimately, while owners and building professionals may value occupant health and well-being, other competing priorities such as construction budget and schedules may win out. That said, when we consider some of the factors influencing design and construction decisions, it’s also useful to look at eventual business costs, which, over the long term, can offset capital costs. Staff costs in particular, including salaries and benefits, typically account for about 90 percent of the business operating costs. With that in mind, focusing on improving occupant health and effectiveness can have a major financial implication for employers.
To improve overall wellness and occupant comfort, there are several factors that building owners and developers can directly control without needing to engage tenants or occupants, which include daylighting, thermal comfort, and ventilation.
Sustainable Interior Specifications and Occupant Health and Well-Being
Photo courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
Fermilab Office Batlava, IL
The Role of Ventilation in Healthy Buildings
Good ventilation and low CO2 are known to positively impact the effectiveness and overall well-being of building occupants. Both new buildings and retrofit projects can attain LEED credits from incorporating ENERGY STAR products or natural ventilation designs. Quality interior air and good ventilation are positive features not only for both building occupants and owners but also for commercial owners seeking tenants.
There are many ways to enhance a building’s indoor air quality, namely through mechanical ventilation strategies or specific products, or a combination of the two.
Ventilation of fresh air through a building via HVAC systems also contributes to a space’s thermal comfort. A well-designed building will be airtight but also receive continuous fresh air for occupants. Done properly, this strategy can maintain consistent indoor temperatures and keep humidity levels comfortable, all while reducing the overall energy costs of the building.
Different sectors tend to favor distinct air-quality strategies, though the trends appear to be similar in terms of prioritized use. Low-emitting products that have low or no VOCs are the most commonly used, followed by mechanical ventilation strategies to improve air quality. CO2 sensors, MERV 8+ filters, and natural ventilation.
Indoor thermal comfort is another important factor when designing healthier, sustainable buildings. Thermal comfort in a building refers to the occupants’ sense of satisfaction and contentment with the thermal environment. A building’s thermal comfort is achieved primarily through a properly insulated building envelope, which controls heat transfer, and through a well-designed and efficiently operated HVAC system. Natural light through windows and skylights can provide additional heat when oriented strategically toward the sun. However, because the sun changes positions over the course of a year, buildings can get either too hot or too cold, so designers need to consider window orientation and shading strategies. Moreover, large windows can compromise the building’s thermal envelope.
Improved Indoor Environmental Quality
New lighting technology can make an interior space feel more like the outdoors while reducing a building’s energy consumption. LED lighting, for example, can mimic daylight to change colors from cooler to warmer tones, reduce glare, and improve light distribution in a space.
Interior monitoring devices are another way to improve indoor environmental quality. These devices continuously monitor and assess indoor air quality and adjust as needed. These new systems help building owners provide occupants with air that is fine-tuned not just for temperature but also for humidity, CO2 levels, particulate matter, and VOC exposure, resulting in a space with reduced energy consumption and improved occupant experience, effectiveness, and well-being.
Sustainable, certified-healthy ceiling and wall materials can improve occupant well-being by enhancing indoor air quality. Designers have a wide range of ceiling styles and features to choose from to help them best provide a positive indoor experience for building occupants. From a practical standpoint, designers can start by choosing materials with clearly identified ingredients and being aware of the potential exposure occupants will have with the products.
Access to Daylight in Healthy Buildings
According to the Dodge Report, “The Drive Toward Healthier Buildings,” owners, architects, and interior designers all rate daylighting as one of the highest-ranking areas of interest (above 75 percent) for improving occupant well-being.4 Common design practices to increase daylight in interior spaces include strategically placed windows, building atriums with skylights, wide accessibility to outside views, and specifying high light-reflectant (LR) ceiling and wall panels.
High-LR ceiling panels enhance the benefits of natural light and indirect lighting by improving overall lighting uniformity and returning up to 90 percent of light back into the space, compared to 80 percent with standard ceilings. A high-LR ceiling can increase brightness up to 25 percent, resulting in improved energy efficiency and reducing energy costs by up to 18 percent.
Increased daylight is critical for large open-plan spaces. High-LR ceilings can increase the amount of light uniformity that’s reflected deeper into the space, giving occupants a brighter, more uniform light. In one of their studies, the Weidt Group measured the impact of daylighting by measuring daylight levels 12 to 22 feet away from the window. When a high-LR ceiling was used, daylight levels increased by 15 to 20 percent.
Photo courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
The combination of daylighting and ceiling panels made of sustainable, healthy materials reflects lighting further into a space and adds to a positive occupant experience, as shown here at a beverage company in Purchase, New York.
Acoustics Bring Noise Control to Healthy Buildings
Noise is another major factor impacting occupant well-being and effectiveness in interior spaces. When sound bounces off hard surfaces such as walls, floors, and ceilings, it can turn into harsh and disruptive noise. In some situations, noise can travel through the walls, thus disrupting the occupants in adjacent rooms. This unwanted noise effects occupants in all types of space, including offices, health-care facilities, and educational environments.
Using acoustical ceiling panels can help reduce unwanted noise in concentration or focus spaces, create collaborative environments, or work to ensure confidentiality in closed spaces for total noise control, design flexibility, and occupant satisfaction. From signature spaces to special application areas, acoustical ceiling and wall panels can address both performance and aesthetic needs throughout a building design.
Ceilings and wall panels can help control sound and impact the social interactions of the occupants in that space. Rooms where sound bounces off hard surfaces may discourage social interaction because people can’t hear each other easily. However, the sound that hits an acoustic ceiling panel surface can be reduced by up to 70 percent in certain situations. Acoustic ceiling panels and and other acoustical treatments that absorb sound, such as blades, baffles, canopies, clouds, or direct-attach acoustical panels, may render a space more inviting and encourage occupants to engage with one another.
Social interactions will differ between building types, and using the right ceiling products can make a big difference. Workers in office spaces, for example, benefit from ceiling panels that address both quiet concentration and energetic collaboration—and everything in between. Likewise, students benefit from ceiling panels that provide good acoustics that enable them to clearly hear the teacher and each other throughout the classroom. In addition, ceiling panels in health-care facilities can help reduce noise from corridors and treatment rooms, which can improve the patient experience and recovery. Finally, ceiling panels can ensure that health-care facilities meet speech privacy requirements of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and can positively influence patient perception of their hospital experience, as reported through the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS).
Photo courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
Ceiling panels made from sustainable materials can reduce noise in a large, open-plan spaces, as shown here at VEEVA in Pleasanton, California.
Replicating Nature
Natural spaces enhance interiors as well, whether they are physically located outside such as a garden or inside with a green wall or the sound of water. Research shows that biophilic design can reduce stress, help people recover more quickly from illness or surgery, increase worker effectiveness, and improve student test scores in schools. It can be something as simple as providing large, sustainably quarried stones as benches either inside or outside the building. Even sculptures and art that simply look natural—such as a metal tree—can make a difference in the occupant experience. This design strategy is particularly important in dense urban environments where occupants may not have access to nature in their daily lives.5
Other strategies may include providing access to green roofs or outdoor garden spaces that encourage occupants to get outdoors during lunch hours or breaks. Not surprisingly, gardens and green roofs are becoming more popular in hospitals and health-care facilities in an effort to incorporate nature into rehabilitation and care.
New technology takes biophilic design one step further to provide mechanically initiated breezes that feel like they came from an open window or incorporating psychoacoustics (the branch of psychology concerned with the perception of sound and its physiological effects) into an interior space. Researchers in Japan, for example, have found that the sound of water works well as a noise-cancelling technique while improving occupant mood in the office.
Photo courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
Indirect lighting and high-LR ceiling panels can improve the quality of a space with no natural light, as shown here at Inova Women’s and Children’s Hospital in Falls Church, Virginia.
Photo courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
Ceiling and wall panels can add to privacy in health-care facilities all while improving indoor air quality, as shown here at Penn Presbyterian Hospital in Philadelphia.
Guidelines for Healthier Building Design
The benefits of healthier buildings can be directly connected to the potential return on investment (ROI) associated with a more deliberate design and material-specification process. This section will discuss various sustainability standards, including LEEDv4, Living Building Challenge, and WELL Building Standard. Specifiers can use these standards as guidelines when designing healthier, sustainable buildings.
Resources for Identifying and Specifying Sustainable Products
Several building industry resources help building professionals quickly and easily identify and specify healthy and sustainable products. HPDs, for example, allow manufacturers to provide product ingredients to specifiers in a consistent and transparent manner and compare product ingredients to government- and scientific authority-published “hazard” lists. Building professionals can use HPDs to help achieve LEED v4 Materials & Resources credit for Building Product Disclosure and Optimization for Material Ingredients and Google’s Healthy Materials Program.
Image courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
Shown is an example of an HPD.
The Declare Product Database is a transparency platform and product database that answers three questions:
- Where does a product come from?
- What is it made of?
- Where does it go at the end of its life?
The label is an easy-to-read “nutrition label” for products that lists a product’s ingredients, which are screened against the Living Building Challenge Red List and demonstrates the product’s compliance in three levels: Declared, Compliant, or Red-List Free.
Image courtesy of Armstrong Ceiling and Wall Solutions
Shown is an example of a Declare label.
EPDs provide life-cycle-analysis-based information, detailing a product’s complete life cycle from raw material extraction to disposal and its potential environmental impact. The EPD then details the impact a product has on the environment at each of the phases of its life cycle. EPDs are developed according to ISO 14025: Environmental Labels and Declarations – Type III Environmental Declarations: Principles and Procedures. EPDs do not rank products, and a product with an associated EPD is not necessarily superior to one without an EPD. Instead, EPDs enable specifiers to compare the impacts of different products.
An EPD provides information for various impact categories:
- Global warming potential (a product’s carbon footprint)
- Smog potential (air pollution/ground level ozone)
- Ozone depletion potential (damage to stratospheric ozone)
- Acidification potential (release of gasses into atmosphere and water)
- Eutrophication potential (impact on water pollution)
One of the most important categories is the embodied carbon of a product. Embodied carbon refers to carbon dioxide emitted during the extraction, manufacture, and transport of building materials.
By referencing information provided in EPDs, we can learn about the carbon footprint of a product. These documents can help building professionals use environmentally responsible materials to design and construct energy-efficient, sustainable, healthier buildings.
It’s important that building professionals know where to go to find resources such as HPDs, EPDs, and other transparency documents. Usually manufacturers will have this information available on their websites, but there are also searchable databases where users can view documents by product category. These databases include Mindful Materials Database, Sustainable Minds, the HPD Public Repository, and the International Living Future Declare Database.
Building Products and Carbon Emissions
The building sector is the world’s single largest emitter of Greenhouse Gases (GHGs), accounting for 30–40 percent of total global GHG emissions. Emissions can be separated into two categories: operational emissions and embodied emissions. Operational emissions include the energy required to operate the building over its life cycle; embodied emissions are the carbon emissions associated with building materials, transportation, and construction. Although operational emissions account for more of a building’s total lifetime carbon footprint, embodied emissions account for a larger percentage of emissions in the near term.
Architecture 2030 estimates that the emissions arising from building materials and construction represent 11 percent of annual global GHG emissions. In addition, the world is on course to add approximately 900 billion square feet of floor space to the built environment between now and 2030. Nearly 75 percent of the carbon footprint of this new square footage will come from embodied carbon, not operational emissions.
Building products and materials can reduce a building’s carbon footprint and even enable buildings to become carbon sinks that help remove excess greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. Traditionally, organizations such as Architecture 2030, AIA, and USGBC have focused on reducing operational carbon emissions; however, in recent years, these organizations have been expanding their focus to address the more immediate challenge of embodied carbon in building products.
Sustainable Building Standards and Certifications
Standards such as LEED v4, Living Building Challenge, and the WELL Building Standard all provide building professionals with guidance and support on ways to design and construct healthy, sustainable buildings. Whether used independently or in conjunction with one another, these standards provide owners and architects guidelines and metrics to measure success for their healthy, sustainable building projects.
Conclusion
Awareness of healthy building design is growing, and for some building owners and developers, it is becoming a priority. Selecting the right materials is particularly important since the materials and products used directly impact the health and well-being of the building occupants. Owners, architects, contractors, and interior designers all play a role in designing interiors that can positively impact occupants’ well-being and experiences while increasing the overall value and performance of the building itself.
Specifying sustainable interior finishes such as ceiling and wall panels contributes greatly to the overall design strategy of healthier buildings. These products can contribute to improved acoustics, thermal comfort, daylighting, indoor air quality, and aesthetics while providing a comfortable and sustainable environment for occupants. Such qualities not only make the environment more appealing to occupants but can also lead to higher levels of tenant and employee retention and productivity.
Since we spend 90 percent of our time indoors, each of us can do our part to contribute to better spaces where we live, work, heal, learn, and play.
End Notes
1“HPDs: Why Product Transparency is the New Norm.” Rate It Green. 20 Oct. 2017. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
2Johnston, Katie. “Can an office building make you healthier and more pro- ductive?” Boston Globe. 10 March 2017. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
3“The Drive Toward Healthier Buildings 2016: Tactical Intelligence to Trans- form Building Design and Construction.” SmartMarket Report. Dodge Data & Analytics. 2016. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
4Gammon, Katharine. “How Interior Designers See Science in Light and Colors.” Inside Science. 21 April 2017. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
5“Sour Mood Getting You Down? Get Back to Nature.” Harvard Health Pub- lishing. July 2018. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
6“Building the Business Case: Health, Wellbeing and Productivity in Green Offices.” World Green Building Council. October 2016. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
Resources
LEED v4. USGBC. 2018. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
Living Building Challenge. International Living Future Institute. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
Welcome to WELL v2. International WELL Building Institute. 2017. Web. 3 Oct. 2018.
Rebecca A. Pinkus is an independent communication consultant, writer, and editor focusing on the intersection of technology, environment, and human health. She has contributed to more than 35 continuing education courses and publications through Confluence Communications. www.confluencec.com
