For years, indoor air quality remained largely out of sight and out of mind, attracting attention mainly when something went wrong. That is beginning to change. As organizations place greater importance on health, resilience and human performance, the air people breathe is increasingly being recognized as a defining element of healthy buildings and healthy workplaces.
Few individuals have contributed more to this evolving discussion than Jason DiBona, CEO of Molekule and a Commissioner on the Global Commission on Healthy Indoor Air. His career has spanned healthcare, medical technology, building innovation and global business leadership, giving him a broad perspective on how indoor environments affect human health. At Molekule, he has focused on translating advances in indoor-air science into practical technologies that help organizations monitor, manage and improve the air within their buildings.
In his Facility Management Journal article, “Breathing Life into Workplaces,” DiBona argues that indoor air quality should be viewed not simply as a facilities concern, but as an issue with significant implications for health, business continuity and workforce performance. From wildfire smoke and airborne illnesses to employee confidence and cognitive performance, he believes organizations have an opportunity to move beyond reacting to air-quality problems and instead build healthier and more resilient indoor environments.
We recently spoke with Jason about the changing importance of indoor air quality, how technology could accelerate improvements and the opportunities he sees for creating healthier buildings in the years ahead.
Q: Your career has taken you through healthcare, technology and the built environment. How has that experience influenced your understanding of the role buildings play in protecting health and helping people perform at their best?
My career has encouraged me to think about health as something much broader than treating illness after it occurs. The environments where people live and work can have a major influence on their health long before they require medical attention. Some of the most meaningful interventions therefore take place outside traditional healthcare settings.
One of the key lessons for me has been understanding the effect of environmental factors on the human body. We inhale thousands of times every day, and the pollutants carried in that air can affect our health well before we ever visit a doctor. Since people spend the vast majority of their lives indoors, the quality of those environments matters enormously. Yet the drive toward energy efficiency and increasingly airtight buildings can also mean that pollutants such as VOCs, pathogens and particulate matter become trapped inside.
This creates an important contradiction: buildings intended to protect and support people can sometimes expose them to conditions that work against human health.
That realization ultimately led me to Molekule. I saw an opportunity to combine lessons from healthcare, science and technology and apply them to the environments where people spend most of their time. The goal is to improve human health and performance at scale by changing the way buildings operate from within.
I believe the future of indoor spaces has to be about more than providing shelter. Buildings should actively support the health and longevity of the people inside them. That means creating environments capable of continuously sensing conditions, responding to emerging threats and helping protect occupants.
Q: You have described indoor air quality as a force multiplier for health and well-being. Why do you believe healthy indoor air is becoming a strategic concern for organizations?
The way organizations think about indoor air has changed dramatically. In the past, it was often treated primarily as a facilities-management or regulatory issue. The COVID-19 pandemic fundamentally altered that perspective by demonstrating that indoor air can have direct implications for health, safety, business continuity and risk management.
Today, organizations that are thinking ahead increasingly understand that healthy indoor air should not be viewed simply as an emergency response. It is becoming a long-term component of strategies aimed at supporting employees and improving performance.
I describe healthy air as a force multiplier because it strengthens the impact of other investments organizations make in their people. Companies spend heavily on wellness initiatives, ergonomic workplaces and mental-health programs, yet the basic environment in which employees spend their days can sometimes receive far less attention. We process an enormous amount of air every day—far more by weight than the food and water we consume.
Clean air should therefore be viewed as one of the foundations of a broader workplace wellness strategy.
When people continuously breathe air containing environmental pollutants, their bodies can be placed under ongoing physiological stress. Instead of operating in an environment conducive to recovery and optimal performance, the body may constantly have to respond to external challenges. It becomes difficult to maximize concentration, energy and resilience when the surrounding environment is working against those goals.
The advantage of clean air is that it addresses the problem at an early stage, reducing that hidden burden before it has the opportunity to affect performance.
Q: Your recent IFMA article discusses connected technologies and advances in air purification. Where do you believe technology will have the greatest impact over the next five years?
I believe the biggest transformation will be the move from conventional air purification toward what I would call air intelligence.
Traditional air-quality systems largely respond to conditions that have already been detected. By combining advanced sensors, AI, connected software and modern purification technologies, buildings can become much more proactive.
Consider a building that can detect the arrival of wildfire smoke, recognize unusual levels of chemical emissions or identify a developing pollution source. Instead of waiting for occupants to notice a problem, the building could automatically adjust its systems and respond to the threat in real time.
That distinction is important. Air quality is the measurement; air intelligence is the system that interprets and responds to those measurements; and air health is the result.
Ultimately, I expect the most advanced buildings to become increasingly responsive environments—quietly monitoring conditions and continuously taking action to protect the health of the people inside them.
Q: As a Commissioner on the Global Commission on Healthy Indoor Air, you work alongside experts from around the world who share the goal of making indoor environments healthier. What makes you optimistic about the future?
One of the most encouraging developments is that this issue is no longer being championed by a single company, sector or country. There is a growing global recognition that the environments in which we live and work are closely connected to our health.
I am deeply honored to be part of the Global Commission on Healthy Indoor Air and to work alongside people from many different fields and regions. Their efforts in areas such as public-health policy, building standards, research and education demonstrate that meaningful progress is already taking place. There is genuine momentum, and importantly, that momentum is increasingly leading to practical action.
We are also seeing a wider shift in how people think about personal wellness. People routinely monitor factors such as sleep, nutrition and HRV, but attention is now expanding toward the environmental conditions surrounding them. Indoor air deserves a prominent place in that discussion because exposure is continuous, even when we are not consciously aware of it.
What gives me the greatest confidence is the convergence of awareness, scientific understanding, policy and technology. We now know considerably more about the relationship between indoor environments and human health, while technological advances are giving us increasingly effective ways to respond.
There is still considerable work ahead, but the conversation is clearly evolving. We are moving beyond simply recognizing the problem toward greater accountability and action.
My hope is that healthy indoor air will eventually cease to be regarded as a premium feature or optional amenity. Instead, it should be understood as a basic requirement of a healthy environment—and, ultimately, a healthy life.
Few individuals have contributed more to this evolving discussion than Jason DiBona, CEO of Molekule and a Commissioner on the Global Commission on Healthy Indoor Air. His career has spanned healthcare, medical technology, building innovation and global business leadership, giving him a broad perspective on how indoor environments affect human health. At Molekule, he has focused on translating advances in indoor-air science into practical technologies that help organizations monitor, manage and improve the air within their buildings.
In his Facility Management Journal article, “Breathing Life into Workplaces,” DiBona argues that indoor air quality should be viewed not simply as a facilities concern, but as an issue with significant implications for health, business continuity and workforce performance. From wildfire smoke and airborne illnesses to employee confidence and cognitive performance, he believes organizations have an opportunity to move beyond reacting to air-quality problems and instead build healthier and more resilient indoor environments.
We recently spoke with Jason about the changing importance of indoor air quality, how technology could accelerate improvements and the opportunities he sees for creating healthier buildings in the years ahead.
Q: Your career has taken you through healthcare, technology and the built environment. How has that experience influenced your understanding of the role buildings play in protecting health and helping people perform at their best?
My career has encouraged me to think about health as something much broader than treating illness after it occurs. The environments where people live and work can have a major influence on their health long before they require medical attention. Some of the most meaningful interventions therefore take place outside traditional healthcare settings.
One of the key lessons for me has been understanding the effect of environmental factors on the human body. We inhale thousands of times every day, and the pollutants carried in that air can affect our health well before we ever visit a doctor. Since people spend the vast majority of their lives indoors, the quality of those environments matters enormously. Yet the drive toward energy efficiency and increasingly airtight buildings can also mean that pollutants such as VOCs, pathogens and particulate matter become trapped inside.
This creates an important contradiction: buildings intended to protect and support people can sometimes expose them to conditions that work against human health.
That realization ultimately led me to Molekule. I saw an opportunity to combine lessons from healthcare, science and technology and apply them to the environments where people spend most of their time. The goal is to improve human health and performance at scale by changing the way buildings operate from within.
I believe the future of indoor spaces has to be about more than providing shelter. Buildings should actively support the health and longevity of the people inside them. That means creating environments capable of continuously sensing conditions, responding to emerging threats and helping protect occupants.
Q: You have described indoor air quality as a force multiplier for health and well-being. Why do you believe healthy indoor air is becoming a strategic concern for organizations?
The way organizations think about indoor air has changed dramatically. In the past, it was often treated primarily as a facilities-management or regulatory issue. The COVID-19 pandemic fundamentally altered that perspective by demonstrating that indoor air can have direct implications for health, safety, business continuity and risk management.
Today, organizations that are thinking ahead increasingly understand that healthy indoor air should not be viewed simply as an emergency response. It is becoming a long-term component of strategies aimed at supporting employees and improving performance.
I describe healthy air as a force multiplier because it strengthens the impact of other investments organizations make in their people. Companies spend heavily on wellness initiatives, ergonomic workplaces and mental-health programs, yet the basic environment in which employees spend their days can sometimes receive far less attention. We process an enormous amount of air every day—far more by weight than the food and water we consume.
Clean air should therefore be viewed as one of the foundations of a broader workplace wellness strategy.
When people continuously breathe air containing environmental pollutants, their bodies can be placed under ongoing physiological stress. Instead of operating in an environment conducive to recovery and optimal performance, the body may constantly have to respond to external challenges. It becomes difficult to maximize concentration, energy and resilience when the surrounding environment is working against those goals.
The advantage of clean air is that it addresses the problem at an early stage, reducing that hidden burden before it has the opportunity to affect performance.
Q: Your recent IFMA article discusses connected technologies and advances in air purification. Where do you believe technology will have the greatest impact over the next five years?
I believe the biggest transformation will be the move from conventional air purification toward what I would call air intelligence.
Traditional air-quality systems largely respond to conditions that have already been detected. By combining advanced sensors, AI, connected software and modern purification technologies, buildings can become much more proactive.
Consider a building that can detect the arrival of wildfire smoke, recognize unusual levels of chemical emissions or identify a developing pollution source. Instead of waiting for occupants to notice a problem, the building could automatically adjust its systems and respond to the threat in real time.
That distinction is important. Air quality is the measurement; air intelligence is the system that interprets and responds to those measurements; and air health is the result.
Ultimately, I expect the most advanced buildings to become increasingly responsive environments—quietly monitoring conditions and continuously taking action to protect the health of the people inside them.
Q: As a Commissioner on the Global Commission on Healthy Indoor Air, you work alongside experts from around the world who share the goal of making indoor environments healthier. What makes you optimistic about the future?
One of the most encouraging developments is that this issue is no longer being championed by a single company, sector or country. There is a growing global recognition that the environments in which we live and work are closely connected to our health.
I am deeply honored to be part of the Global Commission on Healthy Indoor Air and to work alongside people from many different fields and regions. Their efforts in areas such as public-health policy, building standards, research and education demonstrate that meaningful progress is already taking place. There is genuine momentum, and importantly, that momentum is increasingly leading to practical action.
We are also seeing a wider shift in how people think about personal wellness. People routinely monitor factors such as sleep, nutrition and HRV, but attention is now expanding toward the environmental conditions surrounding them. Indoor air deserves a prominent place in that discussion because exposure is continuous, even when we are not consciously aware of it.
What gives me the greatest confidence is the convergence of awareness, scientific understanding, policy and technology. We now know considerably more about the relationship between indoor environments and human health, while technological advances are giving us increasingly effective ways to respond.
There is still considerable work ahead, but the conversation is clearly evolving. We are moving beyond simply recognizing the problem toward greater accountability and action.
My hope is that healthy indoor air will eventually cease to be regarded as a premium feature or optional amenity. Instead, it should be understood as a basic requirement of a healthy environment—and, ultimately, a healthy life.
]]>
