Building Related Environmental Assessment &Technology in Housing, Existing (BREATHE): Methods Employed in an Ongoing Study of Sustainability Parameters, Indoor Environmental Quality Indicators, and Inhabitant Perceptions

The built environment can create a sizeable impact on the health of its inhabitants and on the global environment. The contribution from the residential sector is significant. There are more than 120 million existing homes in the United States and more than 2 million new housing structures are built each year. Sustainability design and remodeling principles can diminish the negative impacts on the indoor and global environments, when adopted. While sustainability programs have gained market acceptance in the design of new construction, their applicability to remodeling of existing structures has lagged. In project BREATHE, we are conducting an evaluation of the indoor environmental quality of existing single-family housing and associated parameters of inhabitant symptomology, construction metrics, heating and cooling systems, climatic factors, ambient air quality, and barriers to the adoption of sustainability technology innovations. This paper reviews dataset framework and data collection methods of this ongoing study.