Indoor Air Quality

    Assessing the impact of smoke-free product use on indoor air quality

    Discover the impact of smoke-free products such as our Tobacco Heating System (THS) on indoor air quality. Research at Philip Morris International (PMI), conducted in controlled environments with the THS, reveals that the aerosol has no negative impact on overall indoor air quality.

    What is indoor air quality?

    Indoor air quality, often abbreviated as IAQ, refers to the quality of the air inside buildings. The impact of our smoke-free products’ use on indoor air quality is an important element of our scientific assessment program.

    Indoor air quality depends on concentrations of a broad spectrum of chemical and biological pollutants. Different standards may be used for evaluating this, including European ventilation performance standard EN 15251 (European Committee for Standardization, 2006) and International Organization for Standardization (ISO) standard methods for measuring IAQ.

    Standard 62.1-2022 from the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE), is intended for regulatory application to new buildings, additions to existing buildings, and changes to existing buildings. It can also guide the improvement of IAQ in existing buildings. This standard describes acceptable air quality as, “air in which there are no known contaminants at harmful concentrations, as determined by cognizant authorities, and with which a substantial majority (80% or more) of the people exposed do not express dissatisfaction.” 

    Indoor air quality can be influenced by many sources. Common pollutants include contaminated outdoor air, emissions from building materials, furniture and furnishings, heating and ventilation systems, indoor activities like cooking or cleaning, and even people themselves.

    How does cigarette smoke affect indoor air quality?

    Secondhand smoke, or environmental tobacco smoke, impacts indoor air quality. It is a combination of the smoke that the user exhales after taking a puff from a cigarette (mainstream smoke) and what comes from the lit tip of the cigarette while no one is puffing on it (sidestream smoke). Cigarette smoke is a mixture of more than 6,000 chemicals that are mainly formed or released by the burning and high temperature pyrolysis of tobacco. Cigarette smoke also contains solid carbon-based particles.

    Public health authorities, including the World Health Organization, have concluded that secondhand smoke causes diseases, including lung cancer and heart disease, in nonsmoking adults, as well as conditions in children such as asthma, respiratory infections, and sudden infant death syndrome. In addition, public health officials have concluded that secondhand smoke can also exacerbate adult asthma and cause eye, throat, and nasal irritation.

    The public should be informed about these conclusions and guided by them. Smokers should not smoke around children or pregnant women.

     

    How does our THS affect indoor air quality?

    Our THS system is not a source of environmental tobacco smoke because they do not burn tobacco or generate smoke. Instead, they heat the tobacco to emit an aerosol that is significantly different than cigarette smoke. At our research center in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, we have installed a room dedicated specifically to performing indoor air quality tests under various conditions. This room is fully furnished and can simulate different environments such as homes, offices, and restaurants.

    The aerosol emitted by the THS is mainly composed of water, glycerin, and nicotine. In a milestone study published in 2019, we measured 24 compounds, including carbonyls, tobacco-specific nitrosamines, and volatile organic compounds, under simulated residential conditions, and found that the use of THS had no negative impact on overall indoor air quality.

    In fact, when THS was used, the levels of the majority (21) of these compounds did not increase beyond the levels already present as background in our dedicated indoor air quality room. Only the nicotine, acetaldehyde, and glycerin were measurably higher than the background, although the measurements of all three were well below the exposure limits established in air quality guidelines.

    Read some of our research on the impact of THS on indoor air quality, and you can find even more related publications in the publications library:

     

    Or explore studies on our products by nonPMI researchers:

    How do we measure the effects of smoke-free products on indoor air quality?

    Our indoor air quality room (24.1 m2 in area or 72.3 m3 in volume) is equipped with typical office furniture, an airtight ceiling, and air filtration. The temperature and pressure can be controlled, and the humidity is continuously monitored.

    The ventilation rate can be altered between 37 and 879 m3/h, corresponding to between 0.5 and 12.2 air changes per hour. The air can be sampled by pumps connected to a mass flow controller. The room is also equipped with an airlock, minimizing how much air can enter the room from outside. The airflow settings can be adjusted to meet the requirements for model environments for office, hospitality, store, and residential conditions, and the air inside the room can be tested in several ways.

    Studies in environmentally controlled rooms have been used over the years to assess the impact of environmental tobacco smoke and THS on indoor air quality. As new smoke-free tobacco or nicotine-containing products that emit an aerosol are developed, it is important to determine their impact on air quality when used indoors. Aerosol measurement methods applied to smoke-free products are continually being adapted and validated to ensure that they can accurately measure the low levels of chemicals found in the aerosols compared with cigarette smoke, for which the methods were originally established. Learn more by reading our publication on the validation of analytical methods for testing the impact of THS on indoor air quality.

    Related articles
    Untargeted assessment strategy
    See the methods and results behind our comprehensive, untargeted screening of smoke-free product aerosols.
    Tobacco Heating System mainstream aerosol compared with reference cigarette smoke
    We observed an average of 90-95% reduction of the levels of HPHCs in the THS aerosol.
    PMI's aerosol chemistry list of 58 constituents
    We regularly monitor the levels of harmful chemicals. See which chemicals are part of the PMI 58 list.

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    Reduced Risk Products ("RRPs”) is the term we use to refer to products that present, are likely to present, or have the potential to present less risk of harm to smokers who switch to these products versus continuing smoking. PMI has a range of RRPs in various stages of development, scientific assessment and commercialization. All of our RRPs are smoke-free products that deliver nicotine with far lower quantities of harmful and potentially harmful constituents than found in cigarette smoke.