Indoor environment and user perceptions in offices in Greenland compared to Denmark

Abstract

Most of the Greenlandic building stock comprises residential houses and apartments. Consequently, the indoor environment in Greenlandic office buildings has not been subject to wide-ranging investigations. The purpose of this study was to investigate the indoor environment in office buildings in Greenland and to characterise the buildings, their indoor environment, and occupant well-being, health and self-assessed performance. This was done through a post occupancy evaluation (POE), where 22 office buildings, including 70 offices in Nuuk and Sisimiut, were evaluated based on indoor environment measurements and questionnaires of occupants' perceived indoor environment. This was compared with data and results from a related study in office buildings in Denmark (26 office buildings, including 83 offices) collected in the same period. The Danish office buildings performed slightly better than the Greenlandic office buildings regarding the perceived indoor environment. The measured indoor environment differed in performance between the countries when benchmarking towards the requirements and guidelines of the Danish Working Environment Authority (DWEA). It was concluded that the office buildings in Greenland did not differ much from the office buildings in Denmark regarding the measured and perceived indoor environment.