Sorption coefficients for interactions between volatile organic compounds and indoor surface materials from small-scale, large-scale, and field tests

Adsorption and desorption by indoor surface materials can have significant impacts on the level of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) indoors. Models for the sink effects consist of two coefficients: sorption (ka) and desorption (kd). Two coefficients were determined from 7 VOCs and 15 combinations of materials using small-scale chamber tests. Additionally, these coefficients were evaluated with data from scaleup experiments involving a large-scale laboratory chamber (10.4 m), two rooms (9.7 and 28.4 m) in a test house, and a second test house (500 m). Conflicting results were obtained from large-scale laboratory and field experiments. Concentration measurements in a large-scale chamber were reasonably well predicted by coefficients from small-scale experiments. Conversely, the level of sorption in field tests was observed at least 2.8 times greater than what was expected from smallscale experiments.