We are often asked whether air duct cleaning it is a valuable service in commercial buildings. Our discussion often goes like this. What kind of questions are you hearing? Are the tenants reporting odors? Are people complaining about air quality? Are you seeing unexplained dust & debris on desktops?
Older office buildings often have internally insulated ductwork. If this ductwork becomes dirty or contaminated with mold, it can become a source of odors, particles and debris on desktops, and indoor air quality complaints. Cleaning the inside surface of lined ductwork, however, is a difficult process. On the one hand, duct cleaners need to be able to effectively clean the surfaces but need to make sure that they are not damaging the internal liner.
We’ve can recount one situation where large sections of the duct system were contaminated with mold. In this instance, building engineers helped us remove a flex duct connected to the main trunk, allowing us to place a digital camera into the ductwork. The photos we collected showed discoloration on the interior surface of the ductwork. This was enough to establish that mold or other contamination was present. Defining the scope of this problem using digital cameras and in-house maintenance staff was the preferred method versus allowing an air duct-cleaning contractor to create the scope. They have a vested interest in you having the work done!
In this instance, cleaning the ductwork required brushing with soft brushes, vacuuming with HEPA vacuums, and encapsulating with an antimicrobial paint. Not only did the process remove almost 100 percent of the mold present on the inside of the ductwork, but it “locked down” any loose fibers from the insulation. This ensured us that fibers and dusts were not going to be causing problems for occupants later on. The cleaning of this ductwork resulted in a fresher smell, less dust and fibers (falling onto tenant desktops), and a happier tenant.
Cleaning ductwork that is externally insulated is much easier. In these instances, a brush can be run through the duct system to agitate any settled dust or debris. A large vacuum attached to the duct system will then pull the dust and debris to be filtered out. No retreatment or encapsulating of the duct system is usually necessary.
Cleaning air-conditioning duct systems is an expensive process. Make sure that you go into this understanding the costs and the risks associated with the work.