IAQ Radio

Norris Gearhart, CR - Infection Control Risk Assessment (ICRA), Disinfection & Diversification Opportunities for Restoration Contractors

This week we welcome Norris Gearhart EVP of Regulatory and Business Practices at First Onsite Property Restoration for a show on Infection Control Risk Assessment, Disinfection and Diversification Opportunities for Restoration Contractors. LEARN MORE at IAQRadio+.
Norris Gearhart is the Executive Vice President of Regulatory Business Practices for First Onsite Property Restoration. Norris has a long career as a solutions-focused leader, coach, and educator. He began his career in the restoration industry in 1985. He has had responsibilities in both the restoration and insurance realm over the span of nearly four decades. During this time, Norris owned or has been part owner of two successful full-service restoration companies building multi-million-dollar books of business. He brings considerable skills and expertise to the table, including being an OSHA outreach trainer for Construction and General industry, loss site inspections, estimating, project management, and as an instructor for the RIA Certified Restorer (CR), Fire Loss Specialist (FLS), and Environmental Risk Specialist (ERS) courses. He is currently serving as a voting member of the IICRC standards committee with the development of the S410 Infection Control Cleaning Standard.
 
As the CEO of Gearhart and Associates, he created and delivered training and consulting services to equip Infection control practitioners, facilities managers, general contractors, disaster response contractors and sub trades with real-world practical knowledge to safely perform work in high-risk environments.
Norris was the COO of TOMI Environmental Solutions, where he implemented and administered policies and procedures and was instrumental in obtaining the EPA registration for SteraMist as a Hospital Disinfectant. Subsequently, he was chosen as a member of the US Aid and World Health Organization team challenged with customizing a disinfection chamber for the Ebola outbreak in Africa. He also responded to global projects including outbreaks of Mears Coronavirus in Saudi Arabia.
In 1995 he established a Restorx franchise for Johns & amp; Lyng Pty Ltd in Melbourne, Australia, now the largest publicly traded restoration group in Australia. While there he taught the Association of Specialist in Cleaning and Restoration (ASCR) now the Restoration Industry Association (RIA), Certified Restoration Technician course multiple times. This was the first time there were CRT’s trained and certified outside of North America.

J. Thomas Pierce, MBBS, PhD - Connecting with People about Occupational and Environmental Health and Safety (OEHS)

This week we welcome Dr. J. Thomas Pierce to talk about his fascinating background and how we can better connect with people about OEHS. Dr. Pierce has been working in the occupational safety and health arena for half a century and his unique background in medicine, laboratories and the field gives him a perspective that is rare. Some may know him from his long running Action Level column in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health or his more recent work writing books that describe OEHS work through his characters.
John Thomas Pierce was born and raised in southeast Kansas. A researcher and physician, he has practiced public health on four continents. He continues to be active in the Occupational and Environmental Health and Safety (OEHS) writing articles, reviewing technical works and most recently as an author. His fifth book “THE ONE-HUNDRED FOOT DROP” is in review now. His first two books were technical entries applicable to industrial hygiene and toxicology and published by the National Safety Council and the American Conference of Industrial Hygienists, respectively. 
His third book, Hospital Safari (Leather Publishing – 2005) described sub- Saharan medical care. Between 2017 and 2020 he wrote and distributed a book entitled “Million Dollar Speedway” that pioneered narrative storytelling in the environmental and public health fields. He is the 2012 recipient of the Rachel Carson environmental leadership award (Environmental Management Committee, AIHA, Falls Church, Virginia) and has raced bicycles at most competitive levels.

Carl Grimes, HHS, CIEC - Defining Health, Including People in Assessments & ICRC S-520

This week we welcome back a long time friend of the show Carl Grimes of Hayward Score. Many of our listeners know Carl has been an advocate for including health in IEQ assessments for years and has been working with sensitive people for decades. Recently Carl worked with ASHRAE to better define health. He also spoke at IAQA on including people in assessments. In addition, Carl has extensive insight into the IICRC S520 over the years and has some thoughts on the latest proposed revisions.
Hayward Score Healthy Home Director Carl Grimes, HHS CIEC, has a unique combination of experiences. He has both the personal experience of how an unhealthy home created his disabling impact, plus the professional experience in various industries working in the Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) field. Carl wrote Starting Points for a Healthy Habitat in 1999, detailing possibilities of what could occur in a house to make its occupants sick, how to identify what was happening, what to do about it, what not to do, and how to verify the results.
The book led to an invitation to speak at the national conference of the Indoor Air Quality Association, which led to an invitation to serve on a committee that wrote the first mold remediation standard. This was followed by revising the ANSI accredited water damage restoration standard, duct cleaning standards for two organizations, fire residue in HVAC systems, and eventually to the creation of IAQA’s Home Health Committee. Under his leadership a new course was developed in partnership with the National Center for Healthy Housing and Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City: Healthy Home Assessment: Principles and Practice. Other activities included serving on the Board of the International Society of Indoor Air Quality and Climate (ISIAQ) as the Vice President of Practice, on the ethics committee of the International Society of Environmental Epidemiology (ISEE), the Joint Task Force workgroup of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology and the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology (AAAAI-ACAAI). The latter developed four medical practice parameters for allergists plus an entire issue of a leading peer reviewed journal on mold. He was on the committee that wrote the ASHRAE Position Document on Limiting Indoor Mold and Dampness in Buildings.
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Martin L. King, ASA, CR - Ed Light, CIH - Light N King Strike - Assessment of Smoke Damage

This week we are updating and adding photos to a great flashback show with Ed Light and the late Marty King. This was an excellent show on the assessment of smoke Damage which is once again a hot topic again. With all the wildfires, train wrecks and recycling fires this show from 3-23-12 is as relevant today as it was then. Let’s learn from those that have been there and done that Marty King and Ed Light.
Martin King was the Restoration Industries Association Technical Adviser for 30 years, where he developed a broad range of restoration procedures and published over 300 articles in trade journals. He also served as CEO of Martin Churchill Associates, Inc. Damage Investigators and Appraisers and has investigated and prepared formal reports on over 2000 property damage cases. Recently Light N King have been working together to improve the knowledge and science behind fire damage restoration and repair. Unfortunately, fire damage and restoration issues often times take a back seat to more “sexy” mold. It seems that mold gets all the attention even though fire damage is an extremely important issue.
Ed Light holds degrees in Environmental Science from the University of Massachusetts (B.S.) and Marshall University (M.S.), is a Senior Fellow of the American Industrial Hygiene Association, has authored over 40 scientific publications on assessment and control of the indoor environment and has chaired several national scientific committees. In the 1980’s, Ed established the West Virginia Department of Health IAQ Program, pioneering efforts to resolve exposure issues related to formaldehyde, asbestos, and termiticides. In the 1990’s, he developed widely used protocols for addressing IEQ complaints (published by EPA, NIOSH and ISIAQ) and managing air quality in occupied buildings under construction (for SMACNA, promulgated by ANSI). As a consultant, Ed has directed more than 1000 multi-disciplinary IEQ investigations, ranging from the White House to the South Pole Station. He has been admitted as an expert witness in numerous litigations.
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Jie Zhao, PhD - Head of Delos Labs and an Executive Vice President at Delos - Managing Indoor Environments for Health, Well-being, Performance and Resilience

This week we welcome Jie Zhao, PhD VP at Delos Labs for a show on how modern buildings are integrating IEQ controls, lighting, acoustics and more to make work environments healthy and high performing.
Dr. Zhao is the Head of Delos Labs and an Executive Vice President at Delos. Delos is a wellness, real estate and technology company headquartered in New York City. As the creator of the WELL Building Standard, Delos develops products, programs and solutions that transform our environments into vehicles for health, well-being, performance, and resilience. Jie leads the research team to support product innovations and market strategies. He is also a lecturer in the Weitzman School of Design at the University of Pennsylvania. His research focuses on Human-building Interactions, including total building performance, occupant behavior in buildings, sensing and controls in buildings, health, comfort, and productivity of building occupants, as well as building energy efficiency and sustainability. Jie received his PhD in Building Performance and Diagnostics from Carnegie Mellon University.

Hal Levin - IAQ Pioneer - Memorial Show Part 2

This week we honor and memorialize Hal Levin an IAQ Pioneer by remastering and adding photos to our part 2 show from 6-18-2010. In this episode we will go into more detail about some of his most interesting projects and explore some current events in the IAQ and building science. A nice obituary for Hal can be found here.

Hal Levin - IAQ Pioneer - Memorial Show Part 1

This week we honor and memorialize Hal Levin an IAQ Pioneer by remastering the first of a 2 part show that was done on April 30, 2010. A nice obituary for Hal can be found at https://www.ashrae.org/news/esociety/in-memory-of-hal-levin
Hal Levin was a Research Architect with Building Ecology Research Group, Santa Cruz, California. Mr. Levin conducted research and consulted on building’s impacts on occupant health and comfort as well as on the larger environment. Since 1978 his work focused on the integration of knowledge about indoor and outdoor air pollution as well as other risk factors into the design, construction, and operation of residential, educational, and commercial buildings and communities.
Hal contributed to the design of many award-winning buildings including the design of ventilation, building materials’ selection, energy conservation, and total environmental quality. He also contributed to the scientific and professional advancements in the fields of life-cycle analysis and risk assessment as indicators of the sustainability of building designs and practices. He coined the term “building ecology” in the late 1970s (first published an article by that title in 1981), focusing on the dynamic and interdependent relationships between buildings, their occupants, and the larger environment. Hal was a leader in numerous professional and scientific societies and received awards from several including ASHRAE's Environmental Health Award in 2008. He was also the Executive Director of ISIAQ, the International Society of Indoor Air Quality and Climate, and President of the Indoor Air Institute. 
Hal was an avid baseball player and pitched competitively in an over-25 hardball league in San Jose, California. He received the Most Valuable Player Award at the Los Angeles Dodgers Adult Baseball Camp.

Thomas Licker, CEICR, CBRM - Sr. VP First Onsite & Board President ABRA - Responding to Fentanyl, Crime, Trauma & Other Biorecovery Situations

Tom Licker is Senior Vice President, Regulatory Business Practice at First Onsite. He specializes in environmental, biorecovery and infection control services. Tom is also Board President for American Bio recovery Association (ABRA) in Washington, DC. Tom has over 25 years of professional experience that includes managing the investigation and remediation of industrial, commercial and residential properties. He has been involved with the risk mitigation of biohazardous and hazardous materials in relation to the food, transportation, pharmaceutical and healthcare industries. He has been responsible for overseeing the clean-up of sites under the CDC, FDA, USDA, RCRA, CERCLA, DOD, and DOE guidelines. Mr. Licker has worked for the United States EPA Site Assessment and Technical Assistance Team as an over-sight consultant for CERCLA and RCRA Corrective Actions. His company was selected as one of the contractors for the response to the Ebola Crisis by the state of New Jersey.
Mr. Licker is also an active member of the New Jersey Food Processors association, New Jersey Food Council, the International Association for Food Protection, International Facility Management Association and the Association for Professionals in Infection Control. In 2011, Mr. Licker earned certification as a Certified Environmental Infection Control Remediator (CEICR) from the American Council for Accredited Certification and in 2016 he earned the ABRA Certified Bio Recovery Master (CBRM) designation. Tom’s degree is from Slippery Rock University in Environmental Sciences.

John Lapotaire - New Mold Assessment Standard, Hurricane Recovery, Spray Foam & More

This week we welcome John Lapotaire of IAQ Solutions in Orlando Florida for a show on a New Mold Assessment Standard, Hurricane Recovery, Spray Foam & More. It’s always great to get a field report from John Lapotaire who is regularly in the field and also very involved with associations developing industry standards. This week we discuss the new IICRC Mold Assessment Standard, the revised IICRC mold remediation standard, hurricane recovery in Florida, Spray foam issues, and how revised building codes that continue to tighten homes and buildings can lead to IAQ issues. LEARN MORE at IAQ Radio+
John P. Lapotaire, CIEC 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.

Robert Higgins - Concrete Moisture Inspection: The Fundamentals

This week we welcome Bob Higgins to wrap up our Moisture Mob series with a final show on Concrete Moisture Inspection: The Fundamentals. After a series of shows that got into the weeds about concrete we feel it would be good to put together a final show that goes over how to take all the information we have aired and use it in the field.
Robert Higgins has been involved with moisture-related issues in concrete and waterproofing since 1976 and has been developing products for such use since 1980. He was a product development chemist for SINAK. Bob is equally involved in product and process development, having developed most of the products manufactured and marketed by his former company SINAK Corporation, as well as owning or co- owning patents for moisture testing. He has expertise in moisture-related concrete issues, having been involved with waterproofing, technical committees, professional groups, lecturing, teaching; and construction defect litigation.
Bob lives and works in Osmond Beach, FL. He has given lectures internationally and throughout the US on concrete and coatings related topics. He also continues to work on various committees and provides expert witness services on topics related to construction, concrete and coatings.
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