Case studies Public Transport as a Keystone of Dynamic Air Quality Monitoring

City of Graz is well known for it's numerous tourist attractions, interesting history and rich culture, but lately it is being named in a rather unattractive manner - City of Dust^1,2. This is a result of inconvenient geographical position in the valley between local mountains which makes it harder for air to flow naturally, especially in cold conditions. Although air quality has been improved in the last 15 years³, city of Graz continues with activities for air quality improvement.

It's a pleasure to say that we, Smart Sense, are a part of such a project, in collaboration with local ITG and A1 Telekom Austria Group. It's one of the first projects globally in which dynamic air quality monitoring is achieved with four mobile Sensees.Environment measuring stations mounted on the vehicles of the public transport. Sensees.Environment stations take air samples along the traffic routes of trams and buses resulting in the great sampling area coverage while sampling frequency remains high. Measuring data will later be used in scientific and expert analysis of air quality dependence on traffic fluctuations. 

Mobile Sensees.Environment stations are optimized for mounting and use in public transport, and low-profile metal casing guarantees compactness and durability of the measuring station. Along with temperature and relative humidity, levels of NO, NO₂, PM2.5 and PM10 are being measured. Air sampling is triggered geographically, and to ensure high quality of sampling independent of vehicle velocity and acceleration, we have developed advanced algorithms. Along with geographical averaging of measurements, system contains algorithms for data validation and interpretation and enables air quality heatmap production. 

Prior to mounting, we tested all four mobile and one stationary Sensees.Environment stations by comparing their measurement data gained at Don Bosco fixed measurement station. Test proved, once again, that data from Sensees.Environment stations are of high quality and that these indicative stations have significant value as supplement to fixed measurement stations. 

1 – Graz von Aktivisten zur “City of Dust” ernannt - LINK

2 - Feinstaubhauptstadt Graz: Großes Feuerwerk der Stadt abgesagt - LINK