This directory indexes the individual substance pages on this site. Each page deals with one contaminant or one closely related family, and answers the same set of questions about it: what it is, where it comes from in UAE buildings, why the local climate and construction pattern change its behaviour, what it does to health, how it is actually measured, what limit applies, and what a building operator can do when a result comes back elevated. The substances are grouped below by chemical class rather than alphabetically, because class largely determines behaviour.
This directory indexes the individual substance pages on this site. Each page deals with one contaminant or one closely related family, and answers the same set of questions about it: what it is, where it comes from in UAE buildings, why the local climate and construction pattern change its behaviour, what it does to health, how it is actually measured, what limit applies, and what a building operator can do when a result comes back elevated.
The substances are grouped below by chemical class rather than alphabetically, because class largely determines behaviour. Compounds in the same class tend to share sources, volatility, sampling media and analytical finish, and the practical consequence is that they tend to be found and controlled together. A directory ordered by name would separate compounds that always travel in company.
Three broader pages sit alongside this series and are not repeated within it. The general treatment of chemical contaminants indoors, the explanation of what the term volatile organic compound actually denotes, and the account of total volatile organic compound measurement all remain separate, because they describe the framework rather than any single substance.
Most individual indoor contaminants have no UAE numeric limit at all.
Of the substances covered here, ten carry a figure that can properly be attributed to a UAE instrument. Eight of those come from a single source: Table 4 of Dubai Municipality's Technical Guidelines for Indoor Air Quality for Healthy Life (DM-HSD-GU119-IAQ, Version 4, 11 December 2024), which lists individual volatile organic compound objectives over 8 hours under clause 9-8-6. Two more, nitrogen dioxide and carbon dioxide, appear in Table 2 of the same guideline. Everything else on this list has no UAE indoor-air value whatsoever.
That is not a gap in this site's research. It is the actual regulatory position, and stating it plainly is more useful than filling the space with a foreign number presented as though it applied. A guideline value from another jurisdiction was derived against that jurisdiction's exposure assumptions, averaging conventions and legal framework, and carrying it across without saying so is how misattributed figures enter circulation.
The point applies with particular force to the semi-volatile substances at the end of this list. Phthalate plasticisers, flame retardants, PFAS and siloxanes are not merely unlimited in the UAE; several are not reliably captured by a conventional air-sampling survey either, so a clean volatile organic compound result says very little about them.
Each figure listed in this directory should be read together with the status of the clause behind it, tabulated in Regulation of indoor chemical contaminants in the UAE.
Reactive carbonyl compounds that require derivatisation rather than ordinary sorbent-tube analysis, so a standard volatile organic compound survey does not report them unless they were specifically requested. Neither of the two substances here carries a UAE numeric value. Formaldehyde, which does, is covered on its own pages.
Acetaldehyde · hexanal
The best-covered class in the Dubai Municipality guideline: benzene, toluene, xylene and naphthalene all carry individual 8-hour objectives in Table 4. Sources divide cleanly between solvent-borne products and combustion or vehicle ingress, and the distinction usually determines the remedy. Ethylbenzene has no individual objective despite always accompanying commercial xylene. Styrene is listed in Table 4, but its printed entry is expressed on a scale so far removed from the rest of the table that it cannot be relied on, and it is not reproduced anywhere on this site.
Benzene · toluene · ethylbenzene · xylenes · styrene · naphthalene
Four of the five have a UAE value. Trichloroethylene, tetrachloroethylene, 1,4-dichlorobenzene and 1,2-dichlorobenzene all appear in Table 4 over 8 hours. Their indoor sources are unusually specific — dry cleaning, washroom deodorant blocks, degreasing, vapour ingress from ground — which makes them among the easiest contaminants to trace to a cause and, often, to remove entirely.
Trichloroethylene · tetrachloroethylene · dichlorobenzenes · dichloromethane · chloroform
None has a UAE numeric value, and all three matter mainly for what they reveal rather than for what they are. A terpene-dominated result usually points to cleaning products or to timber rather than to the fit-out, and terpenes react with ozone to form secondary products including carbonyls, so a cleaning regime can raise a formaldehyde result indirectly.
Limonene · alpha-pinene · 2-butoxyethanol
A mixed group. Nitrogen dioxide and carbon dioxide carry Table 2 values; radon carries a WHO reference level but no UAE figure; ammonia and hydrogen sulphide carry nothing at all and, importantly, are not detected by the sorbent-tube and photoionisation methods used for organic compounds. Carbon monoxide and ozone have their own pages elsewhere on this site.
Nitrogen dioxide · carbon dioxide · ammonia · hydrogen sulphide · radon
The class where measurement, not regulation, is the binding constraint. These compounds partition between air, airborne particles, settled dust and surfaces, so air sampling alone under-reports them and dust sampling is usually the appropriate route. None carries a UAE indoor-air value. Mercury is the exception in one respect: it is controlled upstream as a product-composition limit in DMS 0020:2016 rather than as an air concentration.
Phthalate plasticisers · brominated flame retardants · organophosphate flame retardants · PFAS in indoor dust · polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons · cyclic siloxanes · mercury vapour
Reactive carbonyl compounds that require derivatisation rather than ordinary sorbent-tube analysis, so a standard volatile organic compound survey does not report them unless they were specifically requested. Neither of the two substances here carries a UAE numeric value. Formaldehyde, which does, is covered on its own pages.
The best-covered class in the Dubai Municipality guideline: benzene, toluene, xylene and naphthalene all carry individual 8-hour objectives in Table 4. Sources divide cleanly between solvent-borne products and combustion or vehicle ingress, and the distinction usually determines the remedy. Ethylbenzene has no individual objective despite always accompanying commercial xylene. Styrene is listed in Table 4, but its printed entry is expressed on a scale so far removed from the rest of the table that it cannot be relied on, and it is not reproduced anywhere on this site.
Four of the five have a UAE value. Trichloroethylene, tetrachloroethylene, 1,4-dichlorobenzene and 1,2-dichlorobenzene all appear in Table 4 over 8 hours. Their indoor sources are unusually specific — dry cleaning, washroom deodorant blocks, degreasing, vapour ingress from ground — which makes them among the easiest contaminants to trace to a cause and, often, to remove entirely.
None has a UAE numeric value, and all three matter mainly for what they reveal rather than for what they are. A terpene-dominated result usually points to cleaning products or to timber rather than to the fit-out, and terpenes react with ozone to form secondary products including carbonyls, so a cleaning regime can raise a formaldehyde result indirectly.
A mixed group. Nitrogen dioxide and carbon dioxide carry Table 2 values; radon carries a WHO reference level but no UAE figure; ammonia and hydrogen sulphide carry nothing at all and, importantly, are not detected by the sorbent-tube and photoionisation methods used for organic compounds. Carbon monoxide and ozone have their own pages elsewhere on this site.
The class where measurement, not regulation, is the binding constraint. These compounds partition between air, airborne particles, settled dust and surfaces, so air sampling alone under-reports them and dust sampling is usually the appropriate route. None carries a UAE indoor-air value. Mercury is the exception in one respect: it is controlled upstream as a product-composition limit in DMS 0020:2016 rather than as an air concentration.
Most individual indoor contaminants have no UAE numeric limit at all. Of the substances covered here, ten carry a figure that can properly be attributed to a UAE instrument. Eight of those come from a single source: Table 4 of Dubai Municipality's Technical Guidelines for Indoor Air Quality for Healthy Life (DM-HSD-GU119-IAQ, Version 4, 11 December 2024), which lists individual volatile organic compound objectives over 8 hours under clause 9-8-6. Two more, nitrogen dioxide and carbon dioxide, appear in Table 2 of the same guideline. Everything else on this list has no UAE indoor-air value whatsoever. That is not a gap in this site's research. It is the actual regulatory position, and stating it plainly is more useful than filling the space with a foreign number presented as though it applied. A guideline value from another jurisdiction was derived against that jurisdiction's exposure assumptions, averaging conventions and legal framework, and carrying it across without saying so is how misattributed figures enter circulation.
Dubai Municipality DM-HSD-GU119-IAQ Version 4 (11 December 2024) — Table 4 individual objectives over 8 hours under clause 9-8-6, and Table 2 for nitrogen dioxide and carbon dioxide. Everything else on this list has no UAE indoor-air value whatsoever, so no instrument and no averaging period can be quoted for it.
Because the Dubai Municipality guideline is built around a total volatile organic compound figure, with individual objectives listed for only a small number of named compounds in Table 4 and used as an alternative compliance route under clause 9-8-9. Most substances are captured indirectly within that total rather than individually.
No. It means no UAE instrument has set a number for it. Several substances with no limit, including the semi-volatile flame retardants and plasticisers, are the subject of active international research. The absence of a figure is a statement about regulation, not about toxicology.
No, and this is the most common misunderstanding. Carbonyls need derivatisation, ammonia and hydrogen sulphide need dedicated methods, mercury needs gold-amalgam collection, radon needs long-term detectors, and the semi-volatile compounds need dust sampling. A conventional sorbent-tube survey addresses one part of the list and is silent on the rest.