IAQ Radio

Barry Costa - The Life and Times of an Industry Icon & Educator Extraordinaire

Barry Costa's distinguished career in carpet installation, cleaning, and restoration spans over 50 years, including 39 years as an instructor. He has served on and chaired numerous national committees, contributed to national water damage standards, been a key speaker at conventions and special events, and authored many articles in industry publications. Since becoming an IICRC-approved instructor in 1986, Barry has taught thousands of cleaning and restoration contractors worldwide, helping them earn certifications in carpet repair and reinstallation, water damage restoration, and other areas. After many years of in-person WRT training, Barry transitioned to exclusively live stream/online training in 2020. Now a legend in the cleaning and restoration industry, Barry has had an immensely positive impact on both the industry and his students.

Thomas McGuire - Large Loss Mastery

Good Day and welcome to IAQ Radio+ episode 753. This week we welcome Tom McGuire of Large Loss Mastery for an interview on major disaster restoration projects. Large losses can make or break companies, today we learn from one of the best how to handle these business making or breaking events. LEARN MORE this week on IAQ Radio+.
Tom McGuire is the founder and owner of At Large Loss Mastery. He is a Trainer, Teacher, mentor, and Learner. Tom is a 39-year Large Loss and Disaster Recovery veteran specializing in structural damage restoration/decontamination, ambient control/stabilization, and vital document recovery/vacuum freeze-drying systems. He has worked around the US and internationally in Kuwait City, Singapore, and Costa Rica.

Chris White, PE, LEED AP - The Worlds Most Interesting Engineer

This week we welcome Chris White “The Worlds Most Interesting Engineer”. Chris is a third-generation Professional Engineer and a LEED Accredited Professional experienced in solving mold and indoor air quality problems, conducting asbestos and lead inspections and designing environmental cleanup/remediation after disasters. This week we learn where he picked up the moniker “The Worlds Most Interesting Engineer”.

Kenneth Mendez, CEO & President - Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America

Kenneth Mendez became CEO and President of the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America (AAFA) in 2018. Mendez’s career has bridged the corporate and non-profit sectors. Since joining AAFA, he has led the organization in establishing a new multi-year strategic plan that emphasizes dramatically reducing the impact of asthma and allergies on the underserved and tripling the size of AAFA’s online asthma community. The new strategic plan’s vision is for AAFA to be recognized as the most trusted ally serving the asthma and allergy community.
He is quoted in outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post and NBC Nightly News, among others. Mendez has an MBA in marketing from Columbia Business School and a B.A. in American History and American Art from Harvard College. Mendez also has a personal stake in AAFA’s mission as he and two of his children manage asthma and allergies.

Andy Äsk, Sarah Fanger, Darren Foote, John Lapotaire, John T. Hull - The Winter Break Week 2025 Highlight Show

John T. Hull, RRO has 25+ years in the roofing, waterproofing, and coatings industries. He is a recognized authority on building envelope inspections and assessments, roof restoration, quality assurance, roof asset management; reroof assessments, and roof restoration scope of work and specification development. Specialties include moisture detection within the roof and building envelope as well as roof condition assessments. Mr. Hull has provided technical support, training, and consulting in over 30 Countries. He is an internationally recognized speaker having delivered technical presentations throughout all the America’s, Europe, and Australia. His expertise in roof and building envelope restoration has contributed to projects at NFL stadiums, airports, universities, hospitals, military bases and even the White House.
Andrew C. Ask, B.S. (English). J.D., P.E. is a mechanical consulting engineer who specializes in the retrofit and remediation of HVAC systems in buildings. Early in his career he worked in the Great
Lakes region and spent time in construction and installing air conditioning in many types of buildings. The past 20 years have been devoted to solving humidity problems and replacing HVAC components in Southwest Florida buildings. Andy has five decades of experience solving building science problems and helping people live in healthier environments.
John P. Lapotaire is a Building Envelope & Indoor Environment Consultant providing IAQ consultation for commercial and residential properties. He is a Florida Licensed Mold Assessor, a Council-certified Environmental Thermography Consultant, CETC. Council-certified Indoor Environmental Consultant CIEC. John’s professional experience has led to appointments and elected positions to several international industry association committees and boards. As a CIEC, he has earned the most respected certification in the field of indoor environmental consulting based on his training and field experience in building sciences, industrial hygiene, and indoor environmental risk assessment. The certification documents John’s skills and knowledge regarding design, construction, and operation of buildings with respect to the quality and efficiency of the indoor environment in a manner that could be relied upon by individuals and organizations seeking John’s services as a consultant or advisor for the assessment and management of new or established indoor environments. John’s specialties are, Expert Witness, Cause & Origin Forensic Water Intrusion Investigation, Building Envelope Failure, Indoor Environmental and Indoor Air Quality Assessment, Nuisance Odor Investigation.
Sarah Fanger is the first full-time Executive Director of IAQA to come out of the indoor air quality and restoration industry. She owned and ran an independent restoration company focusing on water mitigation and mold remediation. In addition to running the business, she often worked in the field with her crews and achieved the IICRC WRT and Odor Control Technician certifications. She later shifted course and became a full-time indoor environmental consultant specializing in investigations for mold, moisture, and other indoor environmental hazards in residential and small commercial buildings. Sarah also brings over a decade of experience in association management. She has been Executive Director of IAQA since fall of 2023.

Delphine Farmer, PhD - Colorado State University - Wildfires; What the Science Says

Delphine Farmer, PhD is a Professor in the Department of Chemistry at Colorado State University. Her research focuses on understanding the air we breathe both indoors and out, and how the chemistry of air impacts human health, ecosystems, and even climate. Her recent work has focused on wildfire smoke, starting with aircraft projects flying in large wildfire plumes, and more recently looking at how smoke interacts with building surfaces.
Dr. Farmer grew up in Canada, and received her BSc in Chemistry from McGill University in Montreal. She moved to warmer climates to earn her Master’s in Environmental Science, Policy and Management and her PhD in Chemistry, both from the University of California at Berkeley. Her research focused on forest-atmosphere interactions. Delphine then held a NOAA Climate and Global Change Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Colorado Boulder, working with aerosol mass spectrometers in forests in the Brazilian Amazon and California’s Sierra Nevada mountains. She started making indoor measurements with the HOMEChem project and has extended her indoor work to the NIST test house in Maryland and offices at Colorado State.

Jenny Andrawis - Implement4.com - Property Restoration; AI and Technology

Implement4's Chief Revenue Officer, Jenny Andrawis has over 16 years in the restoration industry and 20 years as a Marketing Executive. Prior to leading Revenue generation initiatives at Implement4, Jenny has held Chief Revenue Officer, Marketing Leadership, Customer Success, and Sales Enablement roles with restoration companies ranging from $20M to over $800M. 
Her strengths include driving integration and alignment between all revenue-related functions, including marketing, sales, customer support, pricing, and revenue management. She maintains excellent communication frameworks across the various organizational functions to maximize revenue production.
Key personal and professional attributes that define Jenny are being diplomatically direct, being results-oriented, a market maker, always leading from the front, and having high emotional intelligence. Jenny focuses on data-driven results, and understands and embraces the differences between marketing and sales.
Jenny is a committee member of the Social Media Club Washington DC, an organization which provides opportunities to share ideas and information about social media. SMC’s primary missions are focused on promoting media literacy, promoting standards based technologies, championing ethical behavior, and sharing collective knowledge.
Jenny is also on Constant Contact’s advisory panel. Her regular participation on different email marketing, social media marketing, and contact management topics helps influence product and service decision-making at Constant Contact.

Jim Akey - Sales Manager Particles Plus - Particle Counters: Fire and Smoke Assessment and the CA Wildfires

Jim Akey is Senior Sales Manager for Particles Plus. He has over 25 years of industry experience working with his customers sharing his application experience and providing solutions for their controlled environment particle counting. Before joining Particles Plus, Jim spent 5 years as Inside Sales Manager for ART Instruments, a particle counter manufacturer that revolutionized the way that particle counters were assembled. Jim also spent 9 years working as Inside Sales Manager for Lighthouse Worldwide Solutions. Jim lives in Oregon and has been very busy working with professionals dealing with wildfire related issues and numerous other particle counting applications. He is a graduate of California State Fresno with a Bachelors of Business Administration.

Bran Lynch, John Pletcher, Mark Springer, Cliff Zlotnik, Rusty Amarante (co-host) - ANSI/IICRC S700 Standard for Fire and Smoke Damage Restoration

Good Day and welcome to IAQ Radio+ episode 746. This week we welcome S700 Consensus Body (CB) Chair Bran Lynch, Vice Chair John Pletcher, Restoration Renaisance Man Mark Springer and CB member Cliff Zlotnik. We also welcome special guest Co-host Rusty Amarante for a look behind the scenes at the development of the ANSI/IICRC S700 Standard for Fire and Smoke Damage Restoration. LEARN MORE this week on IAQ Radio+.
John Pletcher has 40 years in the disaster restoration industry. He is the Owner / operator of Restortech in Herndon, VA for 34 years now. John joined RIA (then ASCR) in 1996 (primarily to get to know Marty King). He was mentored by Marty King for 20+ years and was asked to participate in RIA's Fire Standard (FS) #2 (by Marty King) June 2013 – 2019. In 2017 he became 2nd Vice Chair of FS #2. Today he is the Vice chair of IICRC S700 2019 – 2024. John was the RIA Martin L. King Award winner 2022.
Bran Lynch has been in the property restoration business for over 25 years and is happy to be known as a utility player within BELFOR. He has worked as everything from warehouse helper, to senior project manager to expert witness. His relationship with the S700 began with the development of FS2, and he was honored to be asked to Chair the consensus body for the duration of the S700 development.
Mark Springer is a highly regarded and experienced President/CEO skilled in successfully expanding a multi-location residential and commercial services company across a broad geographical region. Mark has a demonstrated ability to drive market-leading performance, dynamic growth, and profitability. He grew his company from 1 to 7 profitable locations through several acquisitions and greenfield growth. He led the acquisition of the company by private equity in 2020, positioning it as the platform company for FLEET Response, which surged from $20mm to over $150mm in less than 18 months.

Elliott Horner, PhD, FAAAAI & Nicholas Nassikas, MD - Paradigms and Perspectives Indoor Air: Guidelines, Policies, & Regulation

This week we welcome Elliott Horner, PhD & Nicholas Nassikas, MD for a discussion about Indoor air: Guidelines, policies, and regulation from their Paradigms and perspectives article in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (JACI).
Nicholas Nassikas, MD is an attending physician in the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine at BIDMC and an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. His research focuses on how weather and air quality affect the respiratory health of children and adults.
Dr. Elliott Horner, Lead Scientist at UL Solutions has worked in the IAQ field for over 30 years, conducting research and field investigations, providing training, disaster response and litigation support and was director of an IAQ laboratory. He is a recognized expert on fungal allergens and the impact of moisture in buildings, and has published over 50 research papers and book chapters. He has served on committees for ASTM, the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, AIHA, and USGBC and served on the Board of IAQA. He is past chair of the ASHRAE Environmental Health Committee, and is currently on Standard 62.1 and 241 committees. He also holds a Healthcare Construction Certificate from ASHE, is a LEED AP, and is a Fellow of the Academy of Allergy.