The long-term health effects of air pollution – heart attacks, strokes, and lung cancer – are well known. But less is known about how air pollution affects in the short and immediate term, especially in the office. New data shows how air pollution can lower work rates and productivity in the office.

Effects of Air Pollution and PM2.5 on Outdoor Work & Factory

Researchers in North America studied the effects of PM2.5 on the speed at which workers packed pears in factories. They found that higher PM2.5 levels had a negative impact on the speed of packing. Even when PM2.5 levels were within the ‘safe’ limits of some areas, negative impacts on fruit-packing speed were seen in the factory.

Effects of Air Pollution and PM2.5 in Indoor Office Environments

The fact that air pollution affects workers working in outdoor environments may be self-apparent, but how does air pollution affect the productivity or work rate of an indoor office worker? Data shows that indoor PM2.5 levels are typically half those of outdoor environments, so perhaps PM2.5’s effect on indoor office productivity is less or negligible. These studies show otherwise.

#1 The Ctrip Study

A team of researchers tracked the productivity of 4,910 employees at two Ctrip call centres in China. For these workers, measuring performance and productivity in the office was easy–the number of calls employees handled.

They found that when the air quality index (AQI) increased by 10 points, employees answered 0.35% fewer calls. On days when the air quality index was hazardous, the call centres handled about 20,000 fewer calls.

On days when the AQI is 150, Ctrip would need to hire an extra 145 people to cover those calls. Imagine if every company needed to have their own pollution warriors for bad pollution days.

Of course, the alternative is for Ctrip to put in an army of purifiers to keep their air pollution levels down. Maybe something like the Smart Air Blast army:

#2 The German Stock Market Study

Another team of researchers analyzed air pollution and the activity of more than 100,000 stock traders in Germany from 2003 to 2015. They found that a 12ug/m³ increase in PM10 decreased the probability that stock traders would log into their computers and trade stocks by 10%. This was true even when controlling for factors such as weather and the day of the week (because markets are not open on weekends). 

If they had been breathing clean air, there’d have been more logins and more stock traded. Imagine if every stock trader was breathing clean air. The stock exchange may well look like this:

How Is Air Pollution Affecting Productivity?

Of course, air pollution makes people sick and take more sick days. Employees will also have to take care of sick family members. However, the CTrip study didn’t count the effect of sick days, so the effect of air pollution wasn’t from sick days.

Instead, recent research suggests that, even if we’re not getting physically sick, air pollution still affects our brains. For example, air pollution raises blood pressure, and elevated blood pressure causes decreased cognitive performance. Air pollution also affects mood, which could decrease productivity.

The Total Cost of Pollution

Researchers found that air pollution was affecting 4,910 workers at Ctrip call centres and 100,000 stock traders throughout Germany. How big a cost is that when we multiply it by the billions of workers around the world affected by air pollution? The OECD estimates that all of the sick days and rising health costs will cost 1% of global GDP in 2060. That’s more than the cost of 3 million BMWs!

What Can Organizations Do?

One reason many organizations haven’t done anything to fight air pollution in their buildings is probably the sheer cost. Building filters into central air systems often cost tens of thousands of RMB and require approval from building management. Meanwhile, the stand-alone purifier market is full of expensive machines.

Machines like the new Blast that are powerful enough to clean large offices yet inexpensive are still rare but can help change the picture. For example, the Shanghai World Financial Center commissioned an analysis of its office space and found that using Blasts to clean its air would cost less than half of a central air system.

Bottom Line

A growing body of research suggests that air pollution affects our productivity, even at our indoor desk jobs. This productivity loss is taking a toll on the global economy, but new purifiers are making it much more affordable to clean the air.