Air Quality

Air Quality INFO

Recently, the Ministry of Education has acquired carbon dioxide (CO₂) readers with the objective of installing them in all Quebec classrooms, to ensure a rigorous monitoring of indoor air quality.

This week, the Ministry published the first statistics related to CO₂ levels registered by the carbon dioxide detectors installed thus far in all School Service Centres (SSC) and School Boards (SB). 95% of premises with a detector registered a weekly average CO₂ concentration below 1,500 ppm, a sign of good air quality.

• A link to the findings published by the government (in French):
  https://cdn-contenu.quebec.ca/cdn-contenu/adm/min/education/publications-adm/education/qualite-air-dioxyde.pdf
• It is normal for the CO₂ concentration in a place like a classroom to vary during the course of a day, which is why the measurements are averages.
• The installation of CO₂ detectors in classrooms allows school personnel to make more appropriate – either rapid or gradual – interventions, such as opening windows or doors more or less widely or for more or less time, in order to improve the air quality and to avoid high concentrations. A balance must be struck between a good temperature and a good CO₂
• Bear in mind that the acceptable threshold for CO₂ was set at 1,500 ppm by a committee of experts established by the Quebec government, which specifies that the ideal concentration is 1,000 ppm. This is a threshold related to comfort. It is important to note that classes with higher concentrations are not dangerous for the health of their occupants. As a reminder, the standard from the Règlement sur la santé et la sécurité au travail (RSST) recommends an average exposure of less than 5,000 ppm over an 8-hour workday.

Eastern Townships School Board (ETSB)

• Upon receipt of the carbon dioxide (CO₂) readers, the Eastern Townships School Board has put together a team dedicated to the installation and calibration of these CO₂ As of February 24^th 2022, the installation has been completed in 25 of our schools/centers out of a total of 26.
• The data collected from CO₂ detectors is collected centrally by the Ministère de l’Éducation, which determines the averages. So far, 12 of ETSB schools (277 classrooms) are connected and transmit the data to the central.  The School Board does not have direct access to this information but is committed to share the data with parents and staff as soon as it is provided to us by the Ministry.

CO₂ Table for the Eastern Townships School Board

Data collected from the CO₂ readers, on the week of February 14^th, 2022.

Number of schools involved: 12

Number of classrooms involved: 277