Air quality inside the car parks of the shopping malls

• Main Author: Lim, Kiat Siong.
• Other Authors: Chang Wei-Chung
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2009
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Environmental engineering::Environmental pollution
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/16030
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Underground car parks are getting more common in Singapore a result of land storage and increasing demand of car parks for vehicles. Mechanical ventilation system is being used by majority of the underground car parks; however there are still frequent complaints that underground car parks are humid and stuffy. There has been an increase in asthma attacks in underground car park in recent years, prompting the debate that underground car parks possess a higher pollution level as compared to open car parks. In this study, 2 shopping mall car parks were chosen for sampling of the air. The car parks were selected due to the differences in their respective sizes and locations in Singapore. Car park A is relatively smaller in size and is situated at northern-west of Singapore, where the industrial areas are concentrated at the area, while car park B is located at the south of Singapore. Another difference from car park A and B was that the former is a completely underground car park while the latter consists of both an underground car park and a multi-storey (open) car park. Sampling took place at 2 locations in each car park on 2 weekdays and weekends simultaneously. The sampling duration for each day was 8 hours. Pollutant particle counts/ concentrations were obtained from the sampling and analysis of the trend was done. From observing the trend in the information obtained, speculations were that vehicle emission and higher relative humidity would most likely lead to increase in the PM2.5 concentrations in the car parks, while escalation in PM10 concentration would most probably be caused by human disturbance (running would create suspension of PM10 particles in the air etc.) and vehicle disturbance (friction between the vehicle tyre and the ground create dust particles etc.). From the results obtained, it was concluded that the pollutant particle concentration (PM2.5 and PM10) in the studied underground car park was not higher than the pollutant concentration at the studied semi-open car park. Another key conclusion from the study was that larger car parks are not necessary unsafe for people as compared to smaller car parks.