Real-time Air Quality Monitoring Research Articles

Analysis of the Relation between Particle Matter Concentration and Meteorological Parameter at Montevideo City

We present an analysis of particle matter (MP) concentration measured at three stations located in the department of Montevideo, Uruguay. The Montevideo Council and the National Directorate of the Environment of Uruguay are interested in analyzing the possibility of predicting unsettling air quality events by other means not directly related to build and operate a real time air quality monitoring network. A strong correlation between measurements in different air quality stations especially along events of high concentration was obtained; it is intended to be associated with a distributed source. In such cases, high correlation was also found between the pollutant concentration and the meteorological variables temperature, wind velocity and mixing layer depth. As there is no air quality available data in real time, an accurate prediction of meteorological variables seems to be a good option for properly forecasting of air quality in Montevideo city, especially in terms of MP concentrations.

病理科室内甲醛浓度的实时监测分析

目的：通过对病理科空气中甲醛浓度的监测，为治理病理科室内环境污染提供依据。方法：在相同时间点分别用环境监测仪和气相色谱法测定病理科空气中甲醛浓度，用SPSS18.0进行数据分析。结果：用环境监测仪、气相色谱法测定的甲醛浓度分别为(1.32 ± 0.05) mg/m3和(1.31 ± 0.05) mg/m3，均远超公共场所空气中甲醛浓度的限值，且两种测量方法测得结果没有显著性差异；不同时间点的甲醛浓度也不同，夜晚高于白天。结论：中康韦尔系类环境监测仪可方便的用于甲醛浓度实时监测，应采取有效措施改善病理科空气质量保证工作人员健康。 Objective: The working principles of the ENCANWELL environment monitor were introduced in this paper, and its performance was verified for the determination of formaldehyde concentration compared to the national standard method. Methods: The formaldehyde concentration in pathology department was measured with environment monitor and gas chromatographic method respectively at the same time points. SPSS18.0 was used for data analysis. Results: The formaldehyde concentration was (1.32 ± 0.05) mg/m3 and (1.31 ± 0.05) mg/m3 measured with two methods, respectively. They were far beyond the limit standard in the air in public places, and the measured results were no significant difference between two measuring methods. Different time points of formaldehyde concentration are different also, night than during the day. Conclusion: The ENCANWELL environment monitor can be used for real-time monitoring of air quality, and the effective measures should be used to improve air quality assurance department staff health.

Smart monitoring and control system test apparatus.

In underground metal/nonmetal mines, repeated localized short-term exposure to high levels of airborne contaminants can become a serious health issue. Currently, there are no common mechanisms to control or mitigate these short-term high exposures to contaminants. To improve miners' health and safety, the U.S. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health's Spokane Mining Research Division (SMRD) is developing a smart monitoring and control (SMAC) system for the real-time monitoring of mine air quality, with integrated countermeasures to reduce high concentrations of airborne contaminants in localized sections of mines. To develop and test a SMAC system capable of being implemented in an underground mine, SMRD researchers built a test apparatus incorporating a fan, louver, ducting and sensors combined with atmospheric monitoring and control software. This system will institute effective countermeasures to reduce contaminant levels, improving miner safety and health.

A gas sensor array for the simultaneous detection of multiple VOCs

Air quality around the globe is declining and public health is seriously threatened by indoor air pollution. Typically, indoor air pollutants are composed of a series of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that are generally harmful to the human body, especially VOCs with low molecular weights (less than 100 Da). Moreover, in some situations, more than one type of VOC is present; thus, a device that can detect one or more VOCs simultaneously would be most beneficial. Here, we synthesized a sensor array with 4 units to detect 4 VOCs: acetone (unit 1), benzene (unit 2), methanol (unit 3) and formaldehyde (unit 4) simultaneously. All units were simultaneously exposed to 2.5 ppm of all four VOCs. The sensitivity of unit 1 was 14.67 for acetone and less than 2.54 for the other VOCs. The sensitivities of units 2, 3 and 4 to benzene, methanol and formaldehyde were 2 18.64, 20.98 and 17.26, respectively, and less than 4.01 for the other VOCs. These results indicated that the sensor array exhibited good selectivity and could be used for the real-time monitoring of indoor air quality. Thus, this device will be useful in situations requiring the simultaneous detection of multiple VOCs.

Inertial Impaction on MEMS Balance Chips for Real-Time Air Quality Monitoring

This paper reports on integration of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) balance chips with aerosol inertial impactors for real-time monitoring of airborne particulate matter. Cascade inertial impactors have been extensively used for sampling and size separation of micro to nano-size airborne particles since they were first used in 1945. To introduce the real-time measurement capability to such tools, herein, MEMS resonator chips are employed as their impaction substrates. Dual-plate thermal-piezoresistive resonators (TPRs), that are shown to operate as promising mass balances, are integrated within a two-stage custom made aerosol impactor capable of size segregating particles down to a few tens of nanometers. Unlike cantilever-based microbalances or resonators operating in their bulk mode, TPRs provide uniform mass sensitivity over a big portion of their surface area. Upon deposition of airborne particles on the resonant sensors, the mass loading on each sensor and as a result the mass concentrations of size-segregated particles is measured in real-time. The air quality of different environments, including a class 10,000 cleanroom, was analyzed and monitored via the real-time impactor over a four day period. Comparison of the results with those of an optical particle counter demonstrates a clear correlation between the system response and the expected particle counts. Compared to existing optical particle counters, the proposed system offers the added advantage of detecting sub-100nm particles.

Battery-free smart-sensor system for real-time indoor air quality monitoring

Indoor air pollution is one of the serious issues that affect public health nowadays. Therefore, indoor air quality needs to be monitored by a real-time system for early air pollution warning. Until now, most wireless sensors used for air quality monitoring have required power supply from a battery for sensor operation and wireless data communication. This battery, which is attached to a sensing module, makes the wireless sensing module larger and requires regular replacement efforts and high costs. The present study proposes a novel battery-free sensor module to measure the concentration of volatile organic compounds, ambient temperature, relative humidity, and atmospheric pressure for monitoring air quality in indoor environment. The proposed system comprises a smart-sensor tag, and a radio frequency (RF) energy harvester. The sensing circuit, designed using ultra-low power sensors and a microcontroller unit (MCU), consumes low average power of only 0.5mW. The MCU collects data from the sensors and writes the sensing data to the memory in the form of an Electronic Product Code (EPC) Class 1 Generation 1 compliant identification (ID) of the tag. The RF energy harvester with a highly efficient buck–boost converter and a 50-mF supercapacitor for real-time saving of the collected power can sufficiently collect the available RF energy from the reader within a maximum distance of ∼250cm from the reader to supply power for sensing and wireless communication operation of the smart-sensor tag. Therefore, the proposed smart-sensor module can be a battery-free sensor device for monitoring environment parameters in indoor condition. Experiments are conducted to validate and support the developed system for real-time air quality monitoring and warning.

Spatiotemporal evolution of urban air quality and socioeconomic driving forces in China

Air pollution is a serious problem brought by the rapid urbanization and economic development in China, imposing great challenges and threats to population health and the sustainability of the society. Based on the real-time air quality monitoring data obtained for each Chinese city from 2013 to 2014, the spatiotemporal characteristics of air pollution are analyzed using various exploratory spatial data analysis tools. With spatial econometric models, this paper further quantifies the influences of socioeconomic factors on air quality at both the national and regional scales. The results are as follows: (1) From 2013 to 2014, the percentage of days compliance of urban air quality increased but air pollution deteriorated and the worsening situation in regions with poor air quality became more obvious. (2) Changes of air quality show a clear temporal coupling with regional socioeconomic activities, basically “relatively poor at daytime and relatively good at night”. (3) Urban air pollution shows a spatial pattern of “heavy in the east and light in the west, and heavy in the north and light in the south”. (4) The overall extent and distribution of regional urban air pollution have clearly different characteristics. The formation and evolution of regional air pollution can be basically induced as “the pollution of key cities is aggravated—pollution of those cities spreads—regional overall pollution is aggravated—the key cities lead in pollution governance—regional pollution joint prevention and control is implemented—regional overall pollution is reduced”. (5) At the national level, energy consumption, industrialization and technological progress are the major factors in the worsening of urban air quality, economic development is a significant driver for the improvement of that quality. (6) Influenced by resources, environment and the development stage, the socioeconomic factors had strongly variable impacts on air quality, in both direction and intensity in different regions. Based on the conclusion, the regional differentiation and development idea of the relationship between economic development and environmental changes in China are discussed.

무선네트워크기반 공기질 실시간 모니터링 시스템

무선네트워크기반 공기질 실시간 모니터링 시스템

Investigating indoor concentrations of PM10 in an underground loading dock in Malaysia

Risky air contaminants including PM10 can accumulate inside underground confined loading docks because of the enclosed nature and limited contacts of loading docks with ambient air. Exposure to PM10 can increase morbidity and mortality rates. Hence, this study aimed to investigate and model PM10 concentrations in an underground loading dock located at Kuala Lumpur city center, Malaysia. For this purpose, a real-time air quality monitoring instrument was used for measuring PM10 concentrations for 20 consecutive weeks starting from November 8, 2014. After that, the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software was used to analyze measured PM10 concentrations through series of statistical analyses, whereas MATLAB R2013a was employed for developing prediction models of future PM10 concentrations. Moreover, PM10 temporal variation was examined using time series plots. The results showed that short-term PM10 concentrations did not exceed the Malaysian indoor allowable limit of 150 μg/m3. Despite that, PM10 had 8 % probability of exceedance of WHO standard concentration of 50 μg/m3. This indicates that the occupants will be under the risk of prolonged exposure to PM10 even at low concentrations. The results confirmed a strong correlation between PM10 concentrations and diesel-powered vehicles flow. Contrarily, the flow of gasoline-powered vehicles was poorly correlated. Finally, future daily-averaged PM10 concentrations were predicted for the three weekdays that followed the measurement period using single exponential smoothing. The obtained accuracy was at 70 % of measured PM10 concentrations. Future hourly-averaged PM10 concentrations were estimated using single linear regression with an accuracy of 53 %.

Pollution of PM10 in an underground enclosed loading dock in Malaysia

The enclosed nature of underground loading docks results in accumulation of motor vehicles emissions. Thus, concentration of numerous harmful air pollutants including PM10 particles can increase and reach dangerous levels. This paper aims to study short-term and long-term exposure of PM10 particles inside an underground loading dock located in Malaysia. In addition, the correlation with indoor temperature, relative humidity and vehicles flow will be measured. The concentrations of PM10 were measured for three consecutive weeks using the real-time air quality monitoring instrument AQM60. Series of statistical tests and multiple linear regression analysis were applied on the data using SPSS software and MATLAB R2013a. The results illustrated that PM10 daily average concentration was in compliance with the Malaysian guideline of 150 µg/m3. Actually, 95% of instantaneous PM10 concentration readings were below 75 μg/m3. In addition, significant correlation were found between PM10 concentration and indoor temperature, relative humidity and the previous concentration. The multiple R and R2 were 0.91 and 0.83, respectively. PM10 concentration was also correlated with motor vehicles flow. In conclusion, health effects of long-term exposure to small repetitive doses of air pollutant inside underground facilities should be studied and appropriate control measures need to be implemented.

Emerging miniaturized technologies for airborne particulate matter pervasive monitoring

In order to address the increasing demand for real-time and pervasive monitoring of air quality and, in particular, of particulate matter, novel solid-state sensor technologies and compact instrumentation for dust detection have been recently proposed. Within the context of distributed dust monitoring in urban areas, we briefly review the most recent advances in miniaturized optical, mass-sensitive and capacitive approaches based on solid-state technologies for the detection of micrometric and nanometric airborne particles. Different application scenarios (spanning from dense wireless networks in smart-cities, composed of several fixed or mobile nodes, to pocket-sized personal dosimeters) are also discussed. New participatory and ubiquitous monitoring and mapping strategies are presented, being enabled by the embedment of these ultra-miniaturized sensors in handheld mobile devices, such as smartphones, already integrating several MEMS sensors.

The first official city ranking by air quality in China — A review and analysis

Frequent regional haze and fog episodes in China force the central government to adopt air quality as a key indicator to assess the performance of provincial and local governors. The 74 key cities have been selected as pilot cities to carry out real-time air quality monitoring according to the new ambient air quality standards, in which PM2.5 is for the first time included as one of the six compulsory items. The air quality ranking of the 74 cities has been released in the monthly report by the Ministry of Environmental Protection since January 2013. This is the first official city ranking by air quality in China, which makes air quality to be an important aspect of city branding and city competition. The information disclosure puts political pressure on city and provincial governments as their air quality will be watched by the public and the media. The present study provides a review and analysis of air pollution in China from city scale to regional scale based on the monthly reports in 12months from August 2013 to July 2014. The official air quality rankings of the 74 cities are discussed from the aspects of geographical location, economic development mode and regional air quality management. The air quality rankings of the 74 cities provide the evidence that improvement of air quality requires industrial restructuring and sustainable development strategy. In addition, joint prevention and regional emission control are also essential.

Real-time dissemination of air quality information using data streams and Web technologies: linking air quality to health risks in urban areas.

This article presents a new, original application of modern information and communication technology to provide effective real-time dissemination of air quality information and related health risks to the general public. Our on-line subsystem for urban real-time air quality monitoring is a crucial component of a more comprehensive integrated information system, which has been developed by the Institute for Medical Research and Occupational Health. It relies on a StreamInsight data stream management system and service-oriented architecture to process data streamed from seven monitoring stations across Zagreb. Parameters that are monitored include gases (NO, NO2, CO, O3, H2S, SO2, benzene, NH3), particulate matter (PM10 and PM2.5), and meteorological data (wind speed and direction, temperature and pressure). Streamed data are processed in real-time using complex continuous queries. They first go through automated validation, then hourly air quality index is calculated for every station, and a report sent to the Croatian Environment Agency. If the parameter values exceed the corresponding regulation limits for three consecutive hours, the web service generates an alert for population groups at risk. Coupled with the Common Air Quality Index model, our web application brings air pollution information closer to the general population and raises awareness about environmental and health issues. Soon we intend to expand the service to a mobile application that is being developed.

A low-cost sensing system for cooperative air quality monitoring in urban areas.

Air quality in urban areas is a very important topic as it closely affects the health of citizens. Recent studies highlight that the exposure to polluted air can increase the incidence of diseases and deteriorate the quality of life. Hence, it is necessary to develop tools for real-time air quality monitoring, so as to allow appropriate and timely decisions. In this paper, we present uSense, a low-cost cooperative monitoring tool that allows knowing, in real-time, the concentrations of polluting gases in various areas of the city. Specifically, users monitor the areas of their interest by deploying low-cost and low-power sensor nodes. In addition, they can share the collected data following a social networking approach. uSense has been tested through an in-field experimentation performed in different areas of a city. The obtained results are in line with those provided by the local environmental control authority and show that uSense can be profitably used for air quality monitoring.

Real-time GIS data model and sensor web service platform for environmental data management.

BackgroundEffective environmental data management is meaningful for human health. In the past, environmental data management involved developing a specific environmental data management system, but this method often lacks real-time data retrieving and sharing/interoperating capability. With the development of information technology, a Geospatial Service Web method is proposed that can be employed for environmental data management. The purpose of this study is to determine a method to realize environmental data management under the Geospatial Service Web framework.MethodsA real-time GIS (Geographic Information System) data model and a Sensor Web service platform to realize environmental data management under the Geospatial Service Web framework are proposed in this study. The real-time GIS data model manages real-time data. The Sensor Web service platform is applied to support the realization of the real-time GIS data model based on the Sensor Web technologies.ResultsTo support the realization of the proposed real-time GIS data model, a Sensor Web service platform is implemented. Real-time environmental data, such as meteorological data, air quality data, soil moisture data, soil temperature data, and landslide data, are managed in the Sensor Web service platform. In addition, two use cases of real-time air quality monitoring and real-time soil moisture monitoring based on the real-time GIS data model in the Sensor Web service platform are realized and demonstrated. The total time efficiency of the two experiments is 3.7 s and 9.2 s.ConclusionsThe experimental results show that the method integrating real-time GIS data model and Sensor Web Service Platform is an effective way to manage environmental data under the Geospatial Service Web framework.

Indoor Air Quality Real-Time Monitoring Results of Pathology Department

In this work, the objectives were to provide a scientific basis for environmental governance and to ensure staff health by real-time monitoring of indoor air quality of the pathology department. Using eagle eye environment monitor to make a real-time dynamic monitoring of the air quality of the pathological technical room for 30 days, the paper records the monitoring data of PM 2.5, PM 10, formaldehyde, CO2, total volatile organic compounds (TVOC) every day at Beijing time 3 a.m, 10 am, 1 pm, 4 pm, and 10 pm, and makes a summarization and analysis. The average value of CO2 concentration of the 5 time points is (0.05 ± 0.01)%, and each time point concentration are different (P 0.05); the average TVOC concentration of the 5 time points is (0.08 + 0.31) mg/m3. They are all different between the concentration at each time point (P 2 and NO are not checked out. Through the real-time online monitoring of the pathology room, we find that the formaldehyde concentration of different time periods is far more than the safety value standard, and the concentration of formaldehyde, CO2, PM 2.5, PM 10 and total volatile organic compound (TVOC) is different at different time periods, and the concentrations at working time are higher than the non-working time. We must take effective measures to control the concentration of harmful gases in order to ensure the staff’s health.

Estimation of the Deposited Aerosol Particles in Baghdad City, using Image Processing Technique

ABSTRACT In this study, an algorithm was developed to measure the volume and the covered area by the dust particles, and the radius of dust particle deposited for different time hours of the day. Slices transparent glass has been used to collect samples of dust particle deposited for different time of the day in Rusafa area of Baghdad city, were taken digital image of the samples through an optical microscope (EYEPIECE 10X). What have been noticeable are the difference in radii and areas of dust particles deposited as well as the difference in the density of dust particles for each slice according to time that put the slice to deposition. this paper, Keywords Dust particle, Atmospheric Aerosols. 1. INTRODUCTION Air pollution is one of the important problems in latest decades, with increasing use of fuels from oil and natural gas in various fields of life, spread in the environment many air pollutants such as gases resulting from industrial activities or different modes of transport [1].Air pollutants are classified according to the nature of its presence into two main groups: gaseous pollutants and aerosols. An example of gaseous pollutants and hydrocarbons that exist in the form of organic compounds may be gaseous, liquid or solid, such as sulfur oxides, nitrogen oxides and carbon [2]. The aerosol pollutants other are divided into solid and liquid non-permanent, such as the normal dust and pollen. Aerosol sooner or later precipitates out of the air but gases, containing space which launches it and act like the air and will not precipitate [3]. Aerosol light-absorption measurements are important for health, climate, and visibility applications [4]. Michael D. King et al. (1999) [5] Studied the advantages and disadvantages systems of Remote sensing for aerosol application, Where no one sensor system is capable of providing totally unambiguous information. Also a careful intercomparison of derived products from different sensors, to gather with comprehensive network of ground-based sun photometer and sky radiometer systems. W.Partrick Arnottet. al.(2005)[4] exploited the aerosol optics use in experiment develop a model-based calibration scheme for the 7-wavelength aethalometer, and the photo acoustic instrument operating at 532nm is used to evaluate the filter loading effect caused by aerosol light absorption and multiple scattering theory is used to analytically obtain a filter-loading correction function. G. J. Wong et al. (2007) [6] Studied the temporal development for air quality, was develop the image processing technique for enhancing the capability of an internet video surveillance (IVS) camera for real time air quality monitoring, in this technique could to detect particulate mater with diameter less than 10 micrometers(PM10).Xiaolei Yu et. al. (2011) [7] introduced a relationship between aerosol anthropogenic component and air quality in the city of Wuhan, by used satellite remote sensing. A. Bagatet. al. (2013) [8] exploit the aerosol optical depth, Angstrom exponent, single scattering albedo, and polarized phase function have been retrieved from polarized sun-photometer measurements for atmosphere. Where the Angstrom exponent has a meaningful variations respect to the changes in the complex refractive index of the aerosol, and the polarized phase function shows a moderate negative correlation respect to aerosol optical depth and single scattering albedo, so polarized phase function became regarded as a key parameter to characterize the aerosol. In measuring system will be introduced for determine radius, covered area by deposited aerosol particle and deposited aerosol particle volume as a function of day time, will be calculated by using image analysis and computer algorithms.

Air Pollution Monitoring using GIS and Wireless Networking for Air Quality Management

Air pollution is a serious problem in thickly populated and industrialized areas in India especially in Delhi. The air pollution in India is abundant especially in areas where pollution Sources and human population are concentrated .Economic growth in industrialization are proceeding at a rapid rate accompanied by increasing emissions of air polluting sources .Environmental impacts of air pollutants have impact on public health ,vegetation , etc. To prevent or minimize the damage caused by atmospheric pollution suitable monitoring systems are urgently needed which can rapidly detect polluting sources for monitoring. It is important that the current real time air quality monitoring system controlled by GIS (Geographic information system) should be adapted to alleviating this problem. Some of the existing instruments for air pollution monitoring are Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) instruments, gas chromatographs and mass spectrometers. These instruments provide fairly accurate and selective gas reading .but high cost and large size and maintenance cost made them unfavorable for monitoring application on large scale .some of low cost ,small size gas monitoring techniques are electromechanical, infrared, catalytic bead ,photo ionization .The main objective of this work is come up with cost effective, reliable , scalable and accurate real time air pollution monitoring system with wireless sensor network .commercially available electrochemical and resistive heating type sensor is used to sense like gas CO ,NO ,Co2,.So as to carry out air pollution monitoring over an extensive area a combination of ground measure through inexpensive sensors and wireless GIS will be used for monitoring purpose

Design of Distributed Indoor Air Quality Remote Monitoring Network

Aimed at the characteristics of indoor application environment, a real-time wireless monitoring system for indoor air quality based the nRF24L01 and GSM network was proposed. The system built the star subnet structure with nRF24L01 wireless module, used GSM module SIM300 to complete wireless communication between the subnet and GSM network, and achieved GSM network users to remotely monitor indoor air quality. The subnets with master-slave structure mode, which was constituted by the control terminal and multiple data collection terminals, implemented indoor air quality concentration and temperature and humidity data real-time acquisition with the centralized control method. The experimental results show that the subnets can real-time finish wireless data transmission within a distance of 700 meters, and the system with simple structure and stable work can realizes real-time monitoring of indoor air quality.

Spatial Application of WEPS for Estimating Wind Erosion in the Pacific Northwest

<abstract> <bold><sc>Abstract.</sc></bold> The Wind Erosion Prediction System (WEPS) is used to simulate soil erosion by wind on cropland and was originally designed to run simulations on a field scale. This study extended WEPS to run on multiple fields (grid cells) independently to cover a large region and conducted an initial investigation to assess how well WEPS performed in that environment by comparing simulations for two historical dust events with field observations and satellite images in the Columbia Plateau region of Washington. We modified the WEPS source code to allow it not only to run on multiple grid cells but also to save the state of the simulation so that it can be re-initiated from that state in future runs, allowing the model to be started and then stepped through time incrementally under various future climate or forecast weather scenarios. We initially ran WEPS on the entire state of Washington, with the entire Pacific Northwest region as our ultimate target area, to provide PM₁₀ and eventually PM_2.5 emissions from wind erosion events as input to the chemical transport model CMAQ, which is used by the AIRPACT regional air quality modeling system for the Pacific Northwest. Three principal inputs to WEPS are meteorological data, soil data, and crop management practices. These data, at a 1 km × 1 km grid cell resolution, are the basic input data for running the spatially distributed model. The climatic data from a three-year period were stochastically generated based on statistical representations of past meteorological measurements from stations in the region and were used for initializing WEPS, and then a three-day set of meteorological data corresponding with historical dust storm events were selected for simulation by WEPS of wind erosion of cropland in the state of Washington. The crop management data were selected based on the land use and USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) crop management zones, and the soil data were derived from the NRCS SSURGO database. We aggregated the outputs from 1 km × 1 km grid cells into 12 km × 12 km grid cells for easier visualization and then mapped the total surface soil erosion, suspension, and PM₁₀ emissions for each 12 km × 12 km grid cell. This study shows that WEPS can be successfully extended to run from one field grid cell to multiple field grid cells, and the model can identify regions with high potential for soil erosion by wind. It also demonstrates that WEPS can be used for real-time monitoring of soil erosion and air quality in a large region if actual and forecast weather inputs are available.