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Technical Blog
MEDITE SMARTPLY Product Marketing Executive Rebecca Goldsmith investigates…
In the interests of ensuring the safety of both construction workers and building occupants, formaldehyde-based resins in construction materials have always been a preoccupation for built environment professionals.
But this is especially important when it comes to designing and specifying for sensitive environments such as hospitals and health care centres.
According to a recent study published January 2020 by the International Journal of Indoor Environment and Health, it is confirmed that building materials are indeed an important source of air contamination indoors, alongside our own activities, which compound this.
This demonstrates that the clarity of indoor air quality depends in part on the conscious reduction of VOC emissions from each building product used in the construction of our buildings.[1]
Public buildings, such as hospitals, have an immediate need for sustainable construction products which can help promote the well-being of their occupants.
As a manufacturer, proud to put wellbeing first in all of our product developments, MEDITE SMARTPLY’s mission is to provide timber construction panels which are significantly able to contribute to creating safer and healthier environments.
Manifesting this, we have ensured that our entire MEDITE MDF product range exceeds CARB2 certification, which is one of the world’s most stringent tests for emission of formaldehyde. Alongside this, selected specialist MEDITE products are manufactured with no added formaldehyde at all, including MEDITE CLEAR, MEDITE FR CLEAR, MEDITE VENT, MEDITE EXTERIOR and MEDITE TRICOYA EXTREME.
Our entire SMARTPLY OSB product range has no added formaldehyde throughout.
In particular, MEDITE CLEAR was developed especially for healthcare environments and has been shown to less than 1.0mg of formaldehyde present per 100g: equivalent to that of natural wood.
It is important to understand that formaldehyde is naturally present in wood in small amounts, and therefore is in all wood-based products.
However, when formaldehyde-based resins used to bind regular wood panel products are added to the mix, the level of formaldehyde can increase. Specifying MEDITE CLEAR for modern healthcare projects enables building owners and developers to consciously limit the airborne formaldehyde level indoors, for the wellbeing of everyone both working and receiving treatment at hospital.
In fact, MEDITE CLEAR even outperforms the rigid Class E1 (EN622-1) low formaldehyde standards for Europe.
As all MEDITE SMARTPLY products are also completely sustainably produced, specification of MEDITE CLEAR can also contribute to BREEAM ratings and other environmental and wellness building standard certifications.
The quality of the indoor air vulnerable people receiving treatment in hospital breathe is of extreme importance. As even extremely healthy people can suffer from uncomfortable symptoms such as sneezing and eye irritation from too much exposure to high-levels of VOC such as formaldehyde, it is especially important to keep hospital environments as clear as possible.
[1] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/ina.12647
