Leverage real-time sensing, intelligent air cleaning, and continuous performance validation to support ASHRAE Standard 62.1 Indoor Air Quality Procedure (IAQP) strategies, optimize HVAC operation, reduce energy consumption, and maintain healthier indoor environments.
Performance-Based Indoor Air Quality is an approach to building operation that combines real-time sensing, intelligent air cleaning, continuous monitoring, and performance validation to optimize ventilation, improve indoor air quality, and reduce unnecessary energy consumption.
Inspired by the principles of ASHRAE Standard 62.1's Indoor Air Quality Procedure (IAQP), it shifts building management from prescriptive ventilation strategies to measurable building performance—giving facility teams the insight needed to make smarter operational decisions while maintaining healthier indoor environments.
How Buildings Manage Indoor Air Quality
Move Beyond Fixed Ventilation
For decades, maintaining indoor air quality meant continuously increasing outdoor air ventilation—driving up heating, cooling, and energy costs. Performance-Based Indoor Air Quality offers a smarter path forward by combining continuous environmental monitoring with advanced air cleaning and dynamic ventilation strategies to optimize HVAC operation based on real-time building conditions rather than fixed assumptions.
Performance-Based Indoor Air Quality is:
Monitoring indoor environmental conditions
continuously to eliminate fixed-schedule guesswork.
Deploying advanced air cleaning technologies
to maintain healthier indoor environments.
Optimizing ventilation strategies
based on actual real-time room occupancy and demand.
Reducing HVAC energy consumption
and operational costs while supporting sustainability goals.
Commercial building evaluations using ASHRAE Standard 62.1 Indoor Air Quality Procedure (IAQP) demonstrated annual operational savings ranging from approximately $10,000 to $800,000, depending on building size, climate, ventilation strategy, and air cleaning technologies. These savings reflect the potential value of optimizing ventilation based on building performance rather than prescriptive outdoor air rates.
Research evaluating IAQP implementations reported average HVAC energy savings of approximately 13% compared with traditional ventilation approaches. By leveraging air cleaning technologies and performance-based ventilation strategies, buildings can often reduce unnecessary conditioning of outdoor air while maintaining acceptable indoor air quality.
Heating, cooling, and ventilation can account for up to 40% of a commercial building's total energy consumption. Improving HVAC efficiency through smarter ventilation strategies can significantly reduce operating costs while supporting healthier indoor environments.
Studies have shown that demand-controlled ventilation strategies enabled by continuous indoor air quality monitoring can reduce annual ventilation energy loads by 10–80%, depending on building type, occupancy, climate, and control strategy. By responding to real-time building conditions instead of fixed operating schedules, organizations can improve operational efficiency while maintaining acceptable indoor air quality.
You can’t optimize what you can’t measure.
Traditional HVAC systems often rely on design assumptions, schedules, or occupant complaints. Performance-Based Indoor Air Quality begins with real-time visibility into actual building conditions.
NanoDetect PRO and NanoView turn continuous indoor environmental data into actionable intelligence. By deploying these solutions, facility teams can identify trends, validate ventilation performance, and make smarter operational decisions.
When integrated with building controls, real-time CO₂ data can also inform demand-controlled ventilation—helping reduce unnecessary HVAC energy use while supporting applicable ASHRAE 62.1 requirements and healthier indoor environments.
Successfully implementing ASHRAE Standard 62.1 Indoor Air Quality Procedure (IAQP) begins long before equipment is installed.
PlasmaSoft helps engineers, consultants, and building owners evaluate IAQP strategies before implementation by modeling ventilation scenarios, estimating potential operational savings, and demonstrating how air cleaning technologies can support performance-based ventilation.
Whether optimizing an existing facility or designing a new building, PlasmaSoft simplifies the transition from prescriptive ventilation strategies to Performance-Based Indoor Air Quality.
Performance-Based Indoor Air Quality aligns with today's leading building standards and sustainability initiatives, helping organizations support compliance while improving operational performance.
Every building has different operational priorities.
Some organizations begin with continuous indoor air quality monitoring to better understand building performance. Others implement HVAC air cleaning technologies to support IAQP strategies and optimize ventilation, while some first model ventilation scenarios to evaluate potential operational savings before making capital investments.
WellAir's portfolio—including NanoDetect PRO, NanoView, HVAC air cleaning technologies, and PlasmaSoft—allows organizations to adopt Performance-Based Indoor Air Quality at their own pace while building toward a smarter, more connected building strategy.
Every building presents a different opportunity. Talk with a WellAir expert about how sensing, intelligent air cleaning, and performance-based ventilation can help reduce energy use, optimize HVAC operation, and support an ASHRAE 62.1 IAQP strategy.
