VOCs: the invisible smell
Volatile organic compounds are the carbon-based gases evaporating off everything: cooking, candles, paint, new furniture. Some are merely annoying. Some are not.
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Air quality
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Cleaning products: the VOC spike you can smell
Pine, citrus, ammonia, bleach. Most cleaning products produce sharp VOC spikes; some combinations are acutely toxic.
New furniture and paint: the slow VOC bleed
Particleboard, foam, finishes, and many paints off-gas formaldehyde and other VOCs for weeks to months. A new sofa changes the room's baseline.
Bathrooms and showers
A hot shower is a daily humidity event with a side of cleaning-product VOCs. Recognizable, mostly harmless, occasionally a mold-risk signal.
How parameters interact
Air-quality parameters do not change in isolation. Humidity pushes the VOC index. Ozone reacts with limonene to make formaldehyde. Knowing the interactions helps you avoid false alarms.
VOC Index vs TVOC
VOC Index is a relative signal from a MOX gas sensor. TVOC is a concentration-style lab concept. They measure different things.
