Points to Consider

ManualsBrandsBlueAir ManualsAir purifiers450E

Use of air ﬁltration not only makes air clean and pure, but also en-

hances a person’s energy, alertness, and comfort. At the same time,

it helps individuals with respiratory ailments enhance their quality of

life. Air puriﬁers also help alleviate allergy and asthma symptoms.

With in-room air ﬁltration fast becoming recognized as a legitimate

tool for improving personal and public health, air puriﬁers are being

used not only in the home, but also in the ofﬁce, hospital, laboratory,

restaurant, hotel and school.

There are many different air puriﬁers in the marketplace today, some

are frankly better than others at removing airborne pollutants in what-

ever size or form they come. We fervently believe the public should

be able to make informed choices based on independent testing of

individual air puriﬁers by an ethical and well-respected third party.

The air puriﬁers should be proven to be excellent at removing harm-

ful indoor pollutants to the highest possible degree relevant to the

size of the room as well as change the entire air in a room at the rate

of ﬁve times an hour. All air puriﬁers should meet at the very basic

level the desire of the consumer for a product that enhances health

and wellbeing at an affordable price.

An important criteria to consider in selecting an air puriﬁer is air

cleaner performance. Factors (affecting the performance) should be

advised before purchase.

Available Technologies

To understand how the performance of an air puriﬁer is affected it

is important to know what different processes and technologies

are used in air cleaners. The two most common technologies used

in air cleaners are mechanical and electrostatic precipitators or a

combination of the above.

High Efﬁciency Particulate Air (HEPA) ﬁlters use all four principles to

capture particles of varying sizes. HEPA ﬁlters are recognised as

effective by the American Medical Association, the American Lung

Association, and the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and

Immunology.

To increase the percentage of small particles intercepted, electro-

static ﬁlters use an electric charge to boost the force of attraction

between particles and ﬁlter ﬁbres. Passive electrostatic ﬁltration

charges the ﬁlter media, achieving high efﬁciency at ﬁrst; as the

charge decays, efﬁciency gradually diminishes. Active electrostatic

systems continually charge either the ﬁlter ﬁbres or the particles,

maintaining consistent efﬁciency levels over time.

In its publication Indoor Air Pollution: An Introduction for Health Pro-

fessionals, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the United

States notes that air cleaners using active electrostatic technology

alone are ineffective in removing mid-range and large particles. In-

stead a combination of them both, hybrid systems, offer an effective

solution. They combine mechanical and electrostatic technologies,

often achieving signiﬁcantly better performance than either method

alone.

At Blueair, we employ a successful hybrid system. Our patented

HEPASilent™ ﬁlter technology utilises the principles of mechanical

ﬁltration and adds ionisation to achieve higher efﬁciency in capturing

the small particles trapped by interception.

The following tips and tools can help individuals understand what an

in-room air puriﬁcation system can--and can’t--do. These tips can

also help individuals compare performance between the hundreds

of makes and models on the market.

Blueair Buying Guide

Page 1 of 5

Points to consider when buying an in-room air puriﬁer

Summary of content (5 pages)

PAGE 1
Page 1 of 5 Blueair Buying Guide Points to consider when buying an in-room air purifier Use of air filtration not only makes air clean and pure, but also enhances a person’s energy, alertness, and comfort. At the same time, it helps individuals with respiratory ailments enhance their quality of life. Air purifiers also help alleviate allergy and asthma symptoms.
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Page 2 of 5 1 CADR/Filter Efficiency Buyers need not rely solely on a manufacturer’s efficiency claims. Make sure that the unit’s performance is third-party tested also. The Clean Air Delivery Rate (CADR) program is sponsored by the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers (AHAM), an independent industry organisation. It measures the total volume of air that a particular air purification system cleanses of a specific pollutant in one minute.
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Page 3 of 5 roborated filter efficiency and air volume capacity statements, unwillingness to submit an air cleaner for independent AHAM testing, no physical address on brochures or websites, lack of detailed information on filter composition or technology, or the promise of extremely long filter life when compared to similar units. inhaled and exhaled more easily than mid-range particles, even these minute particles may irritate already compromised breathing passages and lungs.
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Page 4 of 5 Tobacco Smoke: Due to its pervasiveness and the complexity of its composition, tobacco smoke is a particular challenge for current air filtration technology, as are other gaseous pollutants. Tobacco smoke is one of the three “yardstick” pollutants in AHAM’s CADR testing. When tobacco smoke is present in the indoor environment, study AHAM’s CADR test results for the units you are considering. The higher the CADR results for tobacco smoke, the better the unit’s ability to remove it.
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Page 5 of 5 Conclusions Evaluate the space required for the unit. Note that while cabinet sizes vary, it is not accurate to assume that a large unit is more effective or, conversely, that a smaller unit is less effective. Efficiency is generally unrelated to size. Your in-room air purifier selection should be based first on efficiency and air volume capacity; then, use space requirements to narrow the choice between units of similar efficiency.