An assessment of ozone levels, UV radiation and their occupational health hazard estimation during photocopying operation

•First quantitative report of ozone level and UV radiation emission from photocopier.•Ozone production is directly proportional with intensity of photocopy operation.•Ozone level from ground floor is significantly higher than basement photocopier.•Ozone production and UV radiation studied has less correlation during photocopy.•Health hazard issue has been evaluated for effect of UV radiation in terms of SED. This study investigates the levels of ozone concentration along with an ultraviolet (UV) and visible spectral radiation at eight photocopy centers in an academic institute, Delhi. Sampling was done in two types of locations, i.e., basement photocopy centers (BPC) and ground floor photocopy centers (GPC) for 8h. Measurements of levels of ozone, UV and visible radiation were done by ozone analyzer, UV radiometer and Field spectra instrument, respectively. Results show that the hourly mean concentration of ozone was observed to be in the range of 1.8–10.0ppb and 5.3–45.8ppb for BPC and GPC, respectively. In terms UV radiations, energy lies between 5.0×10−3 and 7.0×10−3mW/cm2 for ultraviolet A (UVA), 1.0×10−3 and 2.0×10−3mW/cm2 for ultraviolet B (UVB) and 6.0×10−3 and 8.0×10−3mW/cm2 for ultraviolet C (UVC). Correlation between the UV radiations and ozone production observed was statistically insignificant. To know the health hazard occurred to the workers, the standard erythema dose (SED) value was calculated for emitting UV radiation. The SED was estimated to be in the range of 0.02–0.04 and 0.02–0.32 for direct and indirect methods which is less than the guideline prescribed by Commission Internationale del’ Eclairage (CIE). In nutshell, person involved in photocopy operation for their livelihood must be trained and should have knowledge for the long term gradual build up health problems due to ozone and UV production from photocopier. The manufactures should be ultimated with the significant ozone production, so that photocopier machine can be redesigned.