Abstract
Exhaustive odour impact assessment should involve the evaluation of the impact of odours directly on citizens. For this purpose it might be useful to have an instrument capable of continuously monitoring ambient air quality, detecting the presence of odours and also recognizing their provenance. This paper discusses the laboratory and field tests conducted in order to evaluate the performance of a new electronic nose, specifically developed for monitoring environmental odours. The laboratory tests proved the instrument was able to discriminate between the different pure substances being tested, and to estimate the odour concentrations giving correlation indexes (R2) of 0.99 and errors below 15%. Finally, the experimental monitoring tests conducted in the field, allowed us to verify the effectiveness of this electronic nose for the continuous detection of odours in ambient air, proving its stability to variable atmospheric conditions and its capability to detect odour peaks.
Highlights
In recent years there has been a growing interest among the population and environmental protection authorities in issues related to the emission of odours and odorous substances from industrial activities [1,2]
Techniques for the measurement of odours and odorous substances are nowadays consolidated and widely used for the quantification of odour emissions at the emission source [4]. Such techniques include on the one hand instrumental detection, i.e., the use of analytical techniques such as gas-chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS), which allows the identification and quantification of the odorous compounds of an emission
The observations resulting from this study prove that the innovations introduced in the EOS 507 improve the instrument performance in terms of ease of use and odour discrimination capability with respect to the old EOS 835, making it more suitable for the continuous monitoring of environmental odours
Summary
In recent years there has been a growing interest among the population and environmental protection authorities in issues related to the emission of odours and odorous substances from industrial activities [1,2]. Techniques for the measurement of odours and odorous substances are nowadays consolidated and widely used for the quantification of odour emissions at the emission source [4] Such techniques include on the one hand instrumental detection (indirect methods), i.e., the use of analytical techniques such as gas-chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS), which allows the identification and quantification of the odorous compounds of an emission. One drawback of this approach is that, especially when dealing with complex odours, it may be difficult to relate the chemical composition of an odorous mixture to the odorous sensation provoked by the mixture on humans [5,6]. The effects of odorant mixing are often reported to be highly complicated, producing:
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