Renovation – the healthy way

Modernization is an opportunity to get rid of harmful contaminants and to newly design one’s home with healthy building materials. A new checklist helps homeowners with the planning and selection of suitable products.

Asbestos, PCBs, wood preservatives – this list appears like a chamber of horrors in the history of building materials. When embarking on a renovation project today, many property owners still come across these and other problematic materials that have been proven to be harmful to health. Great care and precautionary measures, such as wearing fine dust masks, must therefore be taken when removing these materials. This also applies in the event that the homeowner hires a specialist company to carry out the remediation work.

Homeowners who have taken the trouble to rid themselves of this legacy of pollution will also proceed with great care when installing new components. For the sake of healthy living, only building materials should be used that do not have a negative effect on human health. The purpose of modernizations, such as facade insulation or window replacement, is to make the building envelope tighter and more energy-efficient in order to reduce not only energy consumption but also the associated costs. However, the tighter the building envelope, the less air is exchanged. Even when the air exchange can be partly controlled by manual or automated ventilation, it is much more preferable to prevent emissions from happening in the first place. After all, the fewer pollutants in the air we breathe, the better for our health!

Currently, more and more building materials are being offered free from harmful ingredients such as solvents, phthalates (they are mainly used as plasticizers for plastic materials) and free radicals. However, to be on the safe side and ensure that the selected products can be used without any health concerns, consumers should look out for trustworthy certificates such as the EMICODE^® seal. This is exclusively awarded to products that assure the lowest possible indoor emissions, which makes them ideal for use in airtight buildings. Products carrying the EMICODE^® label were tested for harmful VOC emissions by independent laboratories in special test chambers. To ensure long-term compliance with the VOC limit values, the initial test is followed by regular spot checks carried out without prior notification by independent experts and testing institutes.