A2QMS (Actionable Air Quality Monitoring System)
This project is in line with World Health Organisation (WHO)’s concerns about air quality in cities such as Coventry and towns such as Leamington. It was developed by the Air quality group which includes several councillors and civic leaders.
It proposes the design and development of a cyber-physical system with air quality monitoring capabilities that implements a new methodology for the adoption of a systematic air quality management process in an indoor and outdoor environment. What is innovative about the proposed system is that it is actionable viz., for instance if there too much particulate matter in a room a warning is issues to open a window if the outside air is cleaner. The cloud based intelligent service will collect real time data from a network of low-cost sensors, and convert it into actionable information using predictive model powered by the applications of machine learning and artificial neural network algorithm.
The project scope is services and solutions on an individual level utilising environmental sensor (air quality, noise, heat, temperature) to improve quality of life with respect to health. To this end, the project will develop Smart Adaptive Services based on IoT technologies to provide real time air quality information to individuals and make them aware of the risk and make informed decision.
Why? Air Quality becomes increasingly important as we evaluate our respiratory health [1] and climate in these strangest of times. We in the UK spend about 90% of our time indoors — at home, at work, at school, or when we go to shops or restaurants [2]. Therefore, it is very important to monitor what we breathe in while we are indoor as well as outdoor as the pollution can come from outside with air. Having poor air quality can cause severe health issues. A study by British Lung Foundation stated that the poor air quality has been linked to lung diseases such as cancer, bronchitis and emphysema, asthma and other respiratory illnesses. According to the Global Burden of Disease study 1.6 million people died prematurely in 2017 as a result of air pollution, accounting for 3% of global deaths. 9 out of 10 people breathe air containing high levels of pollutants according to WHO.
On 16 December, Southwark Coroner’s Court in London found that air pollution “made a material contribution” to the death of nine-year-old Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah. https://www.blf.org.uk/support-for-you/indoor-air-pollution/about-indoor-air-pollution
The partners are composed of local community leaders, residents, Councillors, MPs, academics, health specialist have access to engineering institutions as well as to DEFRA’s Air quality monitoring data. The real time data from low-cost air sensors will be calibrated with readings from DEFRA’s monitoring stations. Other open source databases will also be investigated during the project and data will be imported and used in the predictive model. The partners will be using low-cost sensors proposed by “Sensor.Community” project. In addition, the consortium has a sensor manufacture whose senor will be used to validate the accuracy of low cost-sensors.