Compact shelving

Patrick Ravines asks about the possibility that using compact
shelving could restrict air circulation and result in increased mold
and insect damage.

In three extended trips to Indonesia over the past 10 years I have
observed many collections stored in compact shelving in a wide
variety of building types.  My business there was preservation of
library and archival materials so I was on the lookout for mold and
insects and attentive to environmental conditions of collection
storage areas

Most recently (1995), as part of a World Bank GEF Biodiversity
Project, I did worked at the National Herbarium, National Zoology
Museum, and National Agricultural Library collections in Bogor,
which is among the most consistently rainy places on earth.  It
rains an average of 250 days per year and the annual totals exceed
4300 mm (170 inches).  RH everywhere in Indonesia is seldom, if
every, below 70%; in Bogor it is higher.  (My Radio Shack portable
hygrometer died after only six day of unrelenting RH between 88% and
99%.)

Compact shelving has been in place for five to seven years for parts
of the library and archival collections of these organizations.  All
paper-based collections are a mix of modern and pre-1850 papers,
typically stored together.  Some are in buildings of colonial-era
construction, others in modern buildings (1960-1975). None of the
collection areas have full time air circulation, except for those
with "natural" circulation, i.e. opened, unscreened windows.  Others
have part time mechanical cooling, never more than six hours per
day, following by 22 hours of uncirculated air. While there are
interesting variations (often not what you would expect) in
environmental conditions among these building types, I never
observed mold growing on collections in compact shelving.  These
observations were consistent with my observation on previous trips
(1985 and 1989) to other areas of the country.  (In fact, I never
observed mold on any library or archival collections in Indonesia
that could not be attributed to a direct water leak--but that is
another story.)

Insect damage is endemic to the tropics and a constant concern, but
was never observed In Indonesia to be more prevalent in compact
shelving than in other areas.  In Bogor there was a U.S.
entomologist available to trap and identify insects, but he was
unable to trap live specimens in compact shelving areas, even those
adjacent to areas holding collections of similar age and format in
traditional wooden shelving. This is not too surprising since the
compact shelving areas were typically cleaner and were observed to
received slightly more attention from cleaning staff.  This is not
to suggest that insects were not a problem in compact shelving--just
no more so than among other types of shelving.

So, while my training makes me want to agree with Patrick that "one
can expect mould and insect problems to affect the collections in a
short period," when air circulation is reduced and RH is high, my
observations of compact shelving in tropical environments do not
support this. Generally speaking, I  found it possible to understand
what I was seeing in these environments only after I stopped
insisting that what I saw should conform to what I "knew."  This was
never easy to do.  But with the lack of good data and relevant
professional literature, careful observation is sometimes better
that extrapolating from information gathered and interpreted within
a significantly different "field" setting.  In Indonesia at least, I
would not hesitate to recommend compact shelving.  My observations
do not suggest that their many advantages are countermanded by
preservation concerns.

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                  Conservation DistList Instance 11:41
                 Distributed: Friday, October 31, 1997
                       Message Id: cdl-11-41-006
                                  ***