ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Kamal Meattle - Business owner and activist
With its air-filtering plants and sustainable architecture, Kamal Meattle's office park in New Delhi is a model of green business. Meattle himself is a longtime activist for cleaning up India's air.

Why you should listen

Kamal Meattle has a vision to reshape commercial building in India using principles of green architecture and sustainable upkeep (including an air-cleaning system that involves massive banks of plants instead of massive banks of HVAC equipment). He started the Paharpur Business Centre and Software Technology Incubator Park (PBC-STIP), in New Delhi, in 1990 to provide "instant office" space to technology companies. PBC-STIP's website publishes its air quality index every day, and tracks its compliance to the 10 principles of the UN Global Compact, a corporate-citizenship initiative.

Meattle has long been a environmental activist in India. In the 1980s he helped India's apple industry develop less-wasteful packaging to help save acres of trees. He then began a campaign to help India's millions of scooter drivers use less oil. His next plan is to develop a larger version of PBC-STIP, making a green office accessible to more businesses in New Delhi and serving as an example of low-cost, low-energy office life.

More profile about the speaker
Kamal Meattle | Speaker | TED.com
TED2009

Kamal Meattle: How to grow fresh air

Filmed:
3,754,416 views

Researcher Kamal Meattle shows how an arrangement of three common houseplants, used in specific spots in a home or office building, can result in measurably cleaner indoor air.
- Business owner and activist
With its air-filtering plants and sustainable architecture, Kamal Meattle's office park in New Delhi is a model of green business. Meattle himself is a longtime activist for cleaning up India's air. Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

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Some 17 years ago, I became allergic to Delhi's air.
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My doctors told me that my lung capacity
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had gone down to 70 percent,
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and it was killing me.
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With the help of IIT,
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TERI, and learnings from NASA,
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we discovered that there are three
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basic green plants,
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common green plants, with which
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we can grow all the fresh air
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we need indoors to keep us healthy.
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We've also found that you can
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reduce the fresh air requirements
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into the building, while maintaining
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industry indoor air-quality standards.
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The three plants are Areca palm,
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Mother-in-Law's Tongue and money plant.
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The botanical names are in front of you.
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Areca palm is a plant which
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removes CO2 and converts it into oxygen.
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We need four shoulder-high plants per person,
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and in terms of plant care,
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we need to wipe the leaves
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every day in Delhi, and perhaps
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once a week in cleaner-air cities.
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We had to grow them in vermi manure,
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which is sterile, or hydroponics,
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and take them outdoors every three to four months.
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The second plant is Mother-in-law's Tongue,
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which is again a very common plant,
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and we call it a bedroom plant,
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because it converts CO2 into oxygen at night.
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And we need six to eight waist-high plants per person.
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The third plant is money plant,
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and this is again a very common plant;
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preferably grows in hydroponics.
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And this particular plant removes formaldehydes
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and other volatile chemicals.
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With these three plants,
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you can grow all the fresh air you need.
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In fact, you could be in a bottle
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with a cap on top, and you would not die at all,
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and you would not need any fresh air.
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We have tried these plants at our
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own building in Delhi, which is a
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50,000-square-feet, 20-year-old building.
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And it has close to 1,200 such plants for 300 occupants.
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Our studies have found that there is
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a 42 percent probability of one's blood oxygen
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going up by one percent if one stays indoors
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in this building for 10 hours.
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The government of India has discovered
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or published a study to show
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that this is the healthiest building in New Delhi.
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And the study showed that,
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compared to other buildings,
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there is a reduced incidence of
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eye irritation by 52 percent,
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respiratory systems by 34 percent,
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headaches by 24 percent,
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lung impairment by 12 percent and asthma by nine percent.
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And this study has been published on September 8, 2008,
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and it's available on the government of India website.
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Our experience points to an
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amazing increase in human productivity
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by over 20 percent by using these plants.
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And also a reduction in energy requirements in buildings
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by an outstanding 15 percent, because you need less fresh air.
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We are now replicating this in a
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1.75-million-square-feet building,
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which will have 60,000 indoor plants.
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Why is this important?
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It is also important for the environment,
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because the world's energy
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requirements are expected to grow
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by 30 percent in the next decade.
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40 percent of the world's energy is taken
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up by buildings currently,
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and 60 percent of the world's population
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will be living in buildings in cities
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with a population of over one million in the next 15 years.
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And there is a growing preference for living
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and working in air-conditioned places.
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"Be the change you want to see in the world,"
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said Mahatma Gandhi.
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And thank you for listening.
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(Applause)
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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Kamal Meattle - Business owner and activist
With its air-filtering plants and sustainable architecture, Kamal Meattle's office park in New Delhi is a model of green business. Meattle himself is a longtime activist for cleaning up India's air.

Why you should listen

Kamal Meattle has a vision to reshape commercial building in India using principles of green architecture and sustainable upkeep (including an air-cleaning system that involves massive banks of plants instead of massive banks of HVAC equipment). He started the Paharpur Business Centre and Software Technology Incubator Park (PBC-STIP), in New Delhi, in 1990 to provide "instant office" space to technology companies. PBC-STIP's website publishes its air quality index every day, and tracks its compliance to the 10 principles of the UN Global Compact, a corporate-citizenship initiative.

Meattle has long been a environmental activist in India. In the 1980s he helped India's apple industry develop less-wasteful packaging to help save acres of trees. He then began a campaign to help India's millions of scooter drivers use less oil. His next plan is to develop a larger version of PBC-STIP, making a green office accessible to more businesses in New Delhi and serving as an example of low-cost, low-energy office life.

More profile about the speaker
Kamal Meattle | Speaker | TED.com