Moulds and health implications: Building risk assessment in a litigious age

Mould growth in buildings, archives, museums, galleries and our cultural heritage can have detrimental effects on collections, decorative surfaces, materials and contents and can pose a threat to the health of the occupants. This paper is about interrelationships of the internal building environment created by the interactions of building architecture, materials, structures, services, contents and collections with their external environments and the resulting infestation and mould. Mould problems in both modern and historic buildings are mainly the result of defects in buildings, lack of maintenance and gross neglect. Rectifying these defects and ensuring proper maintenance can provide long-term sustainable, holistic solutions to these problems. The author has advocated that correct identification of the mould infestation by an independent scientist is the vital key to all such problems, as all infestation is not equally toxic, pathogenic and destructive. The environmental approach is beneficial to the building fabric, occupants and the wider environment, and the ongoing monitoring of the environmental conditions in buildings ensures the long-term health of building materials, health of the occupants and structures. The author strongly believes — based on scientific, practical experience and successful case studies over the last 33 years — that much damage has been inflicted in the last century by dealing with the symptoms of the problems and not with the cause(s). By proper understanding of the causes, their repetition should be avoided.