When is the peak period of formaldehyde volatility?

Formaldehyde is a gas that is very harmful in life, and it is very volatile. Sometimes formaldehyde can last for more than ten years after volatilization. This means that people need to live in a room containing formaldehyde for more than ten years. This poses a great safety hazard to human health. Everyone knows that formaldehyde is very harmful to the human body and can induce cancer. So when is the peak period of formaldehyde volatilization?

Formaldehyde is actually a relatively volatile substance with a volatilization temperature of 19°C. When the temperature reaches 19 degrees, formaldehyde begins to volatilize. The higher the temperature, the faster it evaporates. From this we can draw some conclusions: if the indoor temperature does not exceed 19 degrees all year round, even if the formaldehyde content in furniture and floors seriously exceeds the standard, there is no need to worry too much about formaldehyde pollution, unless you lick the formaldehyde furniture and floors. Summer is the peak season for indoor formaldehyde emissions. The higher the indoor temperature, the greater the possibility of formaldehyde exceeding the standard. Therefore, warm living rooms and bedrooms are usually the places where formaldehyde is most likely to exceed the standard.

The formaldehyde volatilization cycle of up to 15 years does not mean that the free formaldehyde in the air needs 15 years to diffuse, but that the formaldehyde in furniture and floors takes a long time (15 years) to evaporate completely. If the free formaldehyde in the air does not evaporate, it will diffuse outdoors in less than an hour under good ventilation conditions. However, formaldehyde evaporates while being discharged, so the situation where new volatilization is absolutely not taken into account will not occur.

In this question, we already know that formaldehyde is actually a relatively volatile chemical, so why is the volatilization cycle of indoor formaldehyde so long? The reason is that the source of indoor formaldehyde is very hidden, such as the inner layer of wooden boards, the inside of closets, etc. The formaldehyde on the cut surface of wooden boards may be released into the air within a few months. As the wooden boards wear and depreciate, new cut surfaces will bring new formaldehyde pollution, resulting in the release of indoor formaldehyde for a long time. From this perspective, the release of indoor formaldehyde even lasts for more than 15 years. It’s just that the release is reduced in the later period and no longer exceeds the standard.