When Industry Meets Academia with Bart Cremers
In the built environment sector, we often see two distinct worlds running in parallel. On one side, we have Academia: rigorous, methodical, and focused on deep understanding, yet sometimes detached from commercial realities. On the other, we have Industry: fast-paced, innovative, and customer-focused, but occasionally prone to moving faster than the science can validate.
But what happens when we effectively bridge this gap?
In this episode of Air Quality Matters, I sit down with Bart Cremers , Group Knowledge Consultant at Zehnder Group International AG . Bart occupies a unique and fascinating space in our industry—he describes himself as a "scientist among engineers and an engineer among scientists." With deep experience in R&D, physics, and data analysis, combined with a practical role in a leading global manufacturing firm, Bart offers a rare perspective on how these two worlds can—and must—collaborate to improve indoor environments.
The Friction and The Opportunity
A central theme of our conversation is the "inevitable friction" between research and commercial application. We explore why this friction exists—stemming from different incentives, funding models, and timelines.
Bart discusses the frustration of seeing academic research that relies on outdated technology because the cycle of funding and publishing takes five years, while the industry iterates products every two. Conversely, we discuss the immense value academia brings in providing the "check and balance" that prevents industry from innovating into a dead end—or worse, creating solutions that don't actually deliver healthy outcomes.
The Broken System Bias
One of the most compelling parts of this discussion revolves around a common grievance in the ventilation world: the tendency of field studies to measure "failure" rather than "potential."
We dig into the phenomenon where academic studies on indoor air quality (IAQ) often conclude that mechanical ventilation is ineffective. Bart argues that these studies are frequently measuring systems that were poorly installed, poorly commissioned, or poorly maintained. Essentially, they are measuring the failure of the process, not the technology.
In the episode, we debate how industry can better support researchers to ensure they are studying systems that actually work as designed, and why the industry’s "minimum compliance" mindset is partly to blame for this data gap.
The Future: Service Models and Multifunctional Units
Looking ahead, Bart opens up about where he sees the sector moving. We touch on two topics that every building professional should be aware of:
Ventilation as a Service: Moving away from selling white metal boxes and toward selling "clean air." Bart explains the massive shift in responsibility this requires—from the manufacturer taking ownership of filter changes to guaranteeing performance outcomes.
The Risks of Integration: As we see a push for "multifunctional units" (combining heating, cooling, and ventilation), Bart uses a brilliant analogy involving old radios to explain why simply mashing systems together is a dangerous game for control strategies.
Why You Should Listen
This episode is more than just a technical chat; it is a look behind the curtain at how knowledge is generated and validated in our sector. Hearing Bart explain the nuance of "citizen science" and the complexities of retrofitting ventilation in occupied homes adds a layer of humanity to the engineering that a summary simply cannot capture.
If you are interested in how we move from theoretical models to real-world performance—and the diplomatic skills required to navigate the space between a University Professor and a Product Manager—this conversation is essential listening.
One Take: How Many Sensors Do We Actually Need?
Episode: One Take – Long-term IAQ Monitoring in Office Buildings
In this week's One Take, we strip away the marketing fluff and dive into a data-driven paper regarding a fundamental question that plagues facility managers and air quality consultants alike: How do we actually monitor indoor air quality effectively?
The paper, titled "Long-term indoor air quality monitoring in office buildings," tackles the lack of consistent standards for sensor placement and sampling frequency. Should you measure every minute or every hour? Do you need a sensor in every room or just one per floor?
The researchers utilized a massive dataset from office buildings in Shanghai to challenge the "one size fits all" approach.
The Goal-Oriented Framework
The key takeaway we explore in this episode is the distinction between monitoring for Temporal Trends versus monitoring for High-Concentration Events.
For General Trends: The paper suggests you can get away with surprisingly sparse monitoring. If you want to know how a building performs seasonally, sampling frequencies can be as low as every 90 to 130 minutes without losing accuracy.
For Health & Safety: If your goal is to catch exposure risks (spikes in CO2 or PM2.5), the rules change entirely. The study outlines why you need dense, high-frequency sampling (every 4 minutes) and, crucially, why sensor placement relative to ventilation outlets matters more than you think.
The Air Quality Matters Podcast in Partnership with
Zehnder Group - Farmwood - Eurovent- Aico - Aereco - Ultra Protect -
The One Take Podcast in Partnership with
SafeTraces and Inbiot
Do check them out in the links and on the Air Quality Matters Website.
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