U.S EPA'S PROGRAM NEEDS FOR INDOOR ENVIRONMENTS RESEARCH (PNIER)

摘要

Indoor pollution ranks among the top five environmental risks to public health. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has recently developed a strategic document outlining EPA's research needs for the indoor environment, Program Needs for Indoor Environments Research (PNIER). PNIER was developed with strong collaboration across several EPA offices. This paper presents the criteria used to develop PNIER and describes the needs identified. The needs are extensive and range from basic research on sources and emissions(including biological, chemical and particulate matter), through exposure characterization, health effects and mitigation techniques. It is anticipated that PNIER will: articulate EPA's indoor environments research needs,for both internal and external uses; identify where knowledge gaps exist; help establish a more well-defined indoor environments research presence at EPA; facilitate collaboration between EPA's program offices and research laboratories; and possibly serve as EPA's foundation towards a larger federal cross-agency research strategy on indoor environments research.