The sulphur-based gases sulphur dioxide (SO2) and hydrogen sulphide (H2S) are known for the impact they can have on metals. AQMesh monitors either or both, from waste processing sites to data centres and volcanic regions.
Hydrogen sulphide around and – even worse – escaping from a site can be a problem. As well as presenting a safety concern, H2S is often a nuisance odour. Detection and quantification at very low levels allows the source of the gas to be tracked down and addressed, or real-time continuous readings from around the site can demonstrate compliance with local restrictions.
Mining sites are generally dusty places – but how dusty? Is the health of workers at risk, could local communities be affected or operations compromised?
Air quality monitoring stations have been used by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) to form a new air quality monitoring network around the Mossmorran Complex near Cowdenbeath and Lochgelly, Fife.
Measuring particulate matter (PM) accurately comes with a number of challenges, including effects from humidity and differing particle sizes. Technological considerations are also a factor, such as variable sample flow rates and the physical size and diameter of the sample path, which could affect the number of particles able to be measured.
Each time we think we have found a spectacularly remote air quality monitoring location, an even more inaccessible spot is reported by one of our users. Full-day trips to visit a location have now been beaten by customers who need to charter a plane to reach them. So, remote diagnostics and support are very important.
We are often asked by customers whether AQMesh can operate in cold conditions. Long-term use at temperatures well below freezing, with ice and snowfall, is indeed challenging.
If you are responsible for air pollution around an oil, gas or industrial site, you have a range of options at different price points. AQMesh offers a cost-effective way to continuously monitor ambient air quality, as frequently as every minute, with readings accessed securely online and user-settable alerts.
A UK local authority installed nine AQMesh systems at different points across a busy town, measuring nitrogen dioxide (NO2) at 15 minute intervals, monitoring 24/7. These locations were established monitoring points, where measurements had been taken previously using diffusion tubes, limited to one average reading every few weeks.
Anybody in the market for purchasing a small sensor air pollution monitoring system will need to consider budgets, but it’s not always obvious how the products being reviewed actually compare across their full operational life.
Autonomous power can make all the difference in hyper-local air quality monitoring. With particulate matter sampling needing a little more power than passive gas sensors, solar is the go-to power option, rather than internal battery. Most systems require sufficiently little energy that they can be powered by a relatively small solar panel, but it’s the back-up power management that makes all the difference.
It’s great to see the team at the Department of Atmospheric Chemistry, University of Cambridge using their AQMesh pods for another project, this time in Lagos, Nigeria and Yaoundé, Cameroon.
AQMesh is being used in an innovative intelligent pedestrian crossing system being developed by three collaborators across Italy, Israel and Spain.
Our hydrogen sulphide (H2S) monitoring journey literally started in the sludge lanes of a UK wastewater treatment plant in 2017. Since then, AQMesh has been used effectively in a range of applications.
A UK train operator is carrying out an air quality baselining project at various points around some of the stations it manages.
AQMesh has been used extensively in and around data centres for two main reasons: obligation to monitor emissions from back-up generators and the risk to copper components from hydrogen sulphide.
AQMesh Product Manager, Tom Townend, will be presenting at the EPA 2023 Air Sensors Quality Assurance Workshop on Wednesday 26th July at 1pm ET (6pm BST). He will be speaking about our project in Minneapolis and quality control of large sensor networks measuring total volatile organic compounds (TVOC).
AQMesh is being used as part of the newly revived Breathe Easy Dallas initiative – a project designed to measure and understand air pollution at neighbourhood level.
If you are considering – or are at the point of buying – a system for local monitoring of air pollution, we have used our decade of experience to offer lists of points to consider.
AQMesh is being used for industrial air pollution monitoring around the world because it brings together a range of features and services that have been tailored to the needs of construction, mining, petrochemical and other industrial applications.
AQMesh small sensor air quality monitoring systems have been in use around the world for over a decade now, but it remains the case that support challenges are always greater with ..
Researchers at Newcastle & Northumbria Universities have published the report on their study which used AQMesh to measure air quality around schools in Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
Why would you want to know and what could you do about it anyway? Many processes in the petrochemical, refining, gas and oil industries cause known or unknown emissions of gases and particles into the air.
A wide range of industrial operators, including mining, construction, ports, landfill and the oil and gas industry, are looking more closely at the air quality on and around their operational sites.
AQMesh has been long established as the most proven small sensor system for the air quality monitoring market.
2023 is set to be a big year for AQMesh’s monitoring of particulate matter, with developments in both hardware and data processing offering improved accuracy across key PM fractions.
Environmental Instruments Ltd, the company which manufactures AQMesh, is delighted to announce it is now ISO9001:2015 certified. ISO9001:2015 is the standard which confirms a business is using its quality management system and processes effectively and consistently to meet the requirements of its customers.
2022 marked 10 years of innovation and leadership from AQMesh. To highlight the team’s experience, ongoing forward-thinking and its commitment to pushing the capabilities of small sensor systems, here are the top 10 things AQMesh developed first and refined since it commercially launched in 2012.
With local councils in England being encouraged to apply for a share of a £7m grant scheme dedicated to ‘reduce the impact of air pollution on public health’, the big question still remains – how can local authorities mitigate air pollution without carrying out hyperlocal monitoring to understand where the problem areas are and identify the pollution sources?
AQMesh is currently being used in a number of air quality monitoring initiatives by a range of users. Across the UK, for which today is its annual Clean Air Day campaign, there are a number of pods deployed outside schools, being used by ambulance services, installed at metal foundries and at railway stations.
Many small sensor air quality monitoring systems cannot reliably measure coarse particulate matter, or PM10, because of the technology they use. AQMesh’s proprietary optical particle counter (OPC) delivers high out-of-the-box accuracy across all key particle matter (PM) fractions thanks to its bespoke, in-house design.
2022 has seen AQMesh taken up as a proven and flexible air quality monitoring system by more users, including several in mining and construction.
AQMesh is one of three winners of the Air Quality & Sport Challenge, an initiative by ThinkSport whose aim is to create solutions to help sport organisations tackle climate change.
Ecotec International Holdings, LLC (“ECOTEC”) today announced a strategic minority equity investment by Archrock, Inc. (“Archrock”), Archrock is an energy infrastructure company with a pure-play focus on midstream natural gas compression. In addition to the strategic investment, Archrock will also begin offering ECOTEC’s suite of solutions to its customers in support of their sustainability goals.
AQMesh has been commercially available since 2012 – making it the most proven and relied upon small sensor system on the market. During the last ten years, the team at AQMesh has never stood still by continuously improving the design and functionality of the product in response to the many challenges that localised air quality monitoring has presented around the globe.
A recent study using a network of five AQMesh pods has found that small sensor systems with a properly managed QA/QC process offer valuable air quality measurements, complementing data from expensive reference equipment.
Ecotec International Holdings, LLC (“ECOTEC”), a global leader in methane emissions monitoring, is pleased to announce a strategic investment by funds managed by Intrepid Investment Management, LLC, the investing arm of Intrepid Financial Partners, L.L.C. (“Intrepid”).
Redmore Environmental have used AQMesh to perform baseline air testing on land at a proposed Energy from Waste (EfW) facility in Heysham, Lancashire (UK).
Five AQMesh air quality monitoring pods are currently installed around Keflavic airport in Iceland to monitor gases produced by the nearby volcano at Fagradalsfjall, including hydrogen sulphide (H2S), sulphur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2).
A UK local authority measured the difference in local air pollution levels when reopening roads that had previously been closed for social distancing purposes as part of Covid-19 mitigation efforts.
Two AQMesh pods measuring airborne particulate matter have been loaned to the University of Cambridge, ahead of the COP26 meeting in Glasgow, to support research into measurement of particulate matter.
AQMesh is now being supplied and supported directly in the UK, as a positive step towards providing fast, direct manufacturer support.
Ecotec International Holdings, LLC (“ECOTEC Group”), owner of Environmental Instruments Ltd., the manufacturer of AQMesh, is pleased to announce the acquisition of Gas Data Limited and its parent company, Innovational Technologies Limited, which is expected to strengthen the state-of-the-art portfolio of highest quality gas detection, gas analysis and air quality monitoring solutions.
Data collected as part of the UKRI SPF Clean Air Program has proven that AQMesh out-of-the-box performance for PM2.5 exceeds new US EPA targets*, with excellent results for PM1 and PM10 as well.
AQMesh has partnered with Warwick District Council and Stratford District Council to install air quality monitoring pods at six local primary schools, as part of this year’s national Clean Air Day.
The Breathe London pilot, which used 100 AQMesh pods as part of a ground breaking city-wide network of air quality monitoring stations, proved that small sensor monitoring technology can be deployed successfully to give results comparable with those of reference equipment.
Whilst there may be a growth in city-wide communications integration, “big data” and public interest in local air quality, the challenges of monitoring complex atmospheric chemistry have not changed. Integrating “sensors” can sound straightforward but information about air quality around a city must be handled carefully.
AQMesh has announced this week that all new pods will receive a free 5-year manufacturer’s warranty, as opposed to the standard 12-month guarantee.
AQMesh is designed to be easy to install and use anywhere in the world. Accessing the global mobile phone network has offered straightforward connectivity for the thousands of pods in use, allowing users to focus on measuring local air quality.
Air quality is rarely out of the news and there are many initiatives in this field, from developments around conventional monitoring to IoT and smart city initiatives.
Refinement and development of the AQMesh small sensor air quality monitoring system over many years, and through numerous global co-location comparisons, brings a wealth of unique benefits.
The Breathe London project has this week released a 3D data visualisation story created by the Environmental Defense Fund Europe and Google.
Four AQMesh pods are to be deployed at individual remote monitoring locations near schools in Kitchener, forming a small network to measure levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2), particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10) and carbon dioxide (CO2). A fifth one will be co-located with the provisional air quality monitoring station.
In 2015 a team from the University of Bonn began monitoring air quality around the Geiranger fjord, Norway. In this pilot study pollutant gases were measured using AQMesh, as well as particulate matter.
Breathe London preliminary analysis results reveal substantial NO2 pollution reductions after the UK government implemented restrictions to reduce the spread of Covid-19, particularly after social distancing was strongly encouraged on 16 March
Technology is critical to so many essential services during the current global COVID-19 crisis, but it is also allowing local air quality to continue to be monitored, in real-time, across the world.
S I Analytics has supplied 65 AQMesh pods into Southern Africa since 2016, many of which are used in mining applications. The small, post-mounted air pollution monitoring units measure a range of gaseous pollutants and particulate matter, as well as environmental conditions.
Several years ago wrote an article about the challenges and benefits of local air quality monitoring and it continues to be our most regularly read item on our website. However the ‘small sensor’ air quality monitoring world has moved on during the last three years and we have identified several new challenges and benefits relating to the continual development of air quality monitoring technology.
Three AQMesh pods have been monitoring air quality in Kenya as part of a study to measure the impact of using biogas as an alternative cooking fuel.
The results of the 2019 AIRLAB Microsensors Challenge* were revealed in Paris on 21st January and AQMesh was awarded the highest score for accuracy of all multi-parameter products presented for monitoring of outdoor air quality.
The Breathe London project has been announced as the winner of a SMART 50 Award by Smart Cities Connect, within the Digital Transformation category. Created to better understand Londoners’ exposure to air pollution, Breathe London combines state-of-the-art technology with new data analytics, delivering real-time air quality data at a hyperlocal level in the city.
A network of sensors has been set up in Newcastle in order to give policymakers a more accurate picture of the air being breathed by children.
Last month Environmental Defense Fund Europe (EDFE) together with Mayor Sadiq Khan are releasing the second wave of data from Breathe London, an ambitious collaborative project to measure and map air pollution across the capital.
Whilst not the only AQMesh pods still in regular use since the product was commercially launched in 2013, two AQMesh pods are still in use in Spain and demonstrate the long life of this small sensor air quality monitoring system.
A study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association has found that long-term exposure to poor air quality can have the same damaging effect as smoking 20 cigarettes a day, with air pollution shown to be more dangerous than passive smoking.
Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) has been monitoring Minnesota’s air quality for a number of years, and it is generally considered to be good. However, MPCA wanted to understand how air pollution varies across small distances in order to minimise vulnerable communities’ exposure to harmful pollutants.
Detailed information on London’s (UK) air pollution is now being published on breathelondon.org, the website for a new collaborative project to paint a clearer picture of the city’s air quality.
Schools near Glasgow have been monitoring air quality as part of a project aiming to reduce the levels of pollution emitted by vehicles as they drop off and collect children.
Supporting the aims of Clean Air Day today, 20th June 2019, the Guardian has published a short film demonstrating the changing levels of pollution that children are exposed to as they walk to school in London.
Following a successful evaluation phase in 2018, AQMesh small sensor air quality monitoring ‘pods’ have been selected for use in a project to control the ventilation of a road tunnel in the city of Marseille.
Suite à une phase d’évaluation et en raison de sa qualité de mesure, la solution AQMesh a été sélectionnée dans le cadre d’un projet d’asservissement de la ventilation d’un tunnel routier dans la ville de Marseille.
A new network of air pollution monitors has been installed to record emissions from cruise ships docking in Greenwich.
The AQMesh small sensor air quality monitoring system already offers flexibility of monitoring location – through independent power and communications – as well as high data quality and traceability. Now the platform is even more flexible offering up to 20 different data channels.
Few people know how clean the air is where they live, work, exercise or where their children go to school. Although air quality can be shown to vary significantly over short distances, air pollution is generally measured using a small number of large, expensive and high quality monitoring stations.
North Americans will be well aware of the particularly harsh weather in the early months of 2019, but AQMesh has taken conditions in its stride. The AQMesh stated operating range of -20°C to + 40°C is backed up by long-term operation across a wide range of climates
In an inter-connected world, air quality is increasingly becoming another measurement made available to the public, but how reliable is the data?
AQMesh has been used in a project at the Port of Kiel, Germany, to measure emissions of nitrous oxides (NOx) and fine particulate matter (PM) around its cruise ship terminal.
Recent co-location comparison trials against certified reference equipment continue to prove AQMesh performance and reliability for localised air quality monitoring.
The UK’s first Urban Observatory, led by Newcastle University, has been designed to provide a digital view of how cities work. AQMesh air quality monitoring equipment is being deployed across Newcastle and Gateshead in conjunction with other instruments for monitoring parameters such as air and water quality, noise, weather, energy use, traffic and even tweets.
On Sunday 13th May 2018, Cardiff Council organised a car-free day in the city’s central area. As a result of this event air quality monitoring data showed an average 69% drop in nitrogen dioxide (NO2) – one of the pollutants of greatest public health concern.
AQMesh is now able to offer CO2 and H2S within its range of gas options for local air pollution monitoring. The NDIR CO2 sensor, which can be offered within a single AQMesh pod alongside five other gases out of NO, NO2, O3, CO, SO2 or H2S, as well as PM1, PM2.5, PM10, temperature, pressure and humidity, has been developed to deliver a higher performance than those typically used for indoor air quality monitoring.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan has launched a new, street-by-street monitoring system that will help to improve that capital’s air quality. From July 2018, and operating for a year, London will benefit from what is being described as the world’s most sophisticated air quality monitoring system.
Extensive research has shown that indoor air quality is often worse than outdoors. Closed system buildings trap harmful particles inside, and external air intakes can bring in more polluted air from outside.
Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) has purchased fifty AQMesh pods to measure key air pollution gases and particulate matter across fifty different zip code areas.
The team at AQMesh continue to receive many enquiries from smart city initiatives and are concerned that integrators risk undermining entire projects by distributing meaningless or misleading air quality information.
Oxford City Council has been managing two AQMesh pods, supplied by Air Monitors Ltd, in order to monitor the impact the new Westgate centre is having on local air quality.
A new paper published by the American Chemical Society (ACS Sensors) reviews the use of amperometric electrochemical gas sensors for monitoring inorganic gases that affect urban air quality.
In October, the AQMesh distributor in Germany – Envilyse – was personally invited to Austria to take part in an annual conference for the ambient air community.
Two AQMesh pods were used to measure NO, NO2, O3 and CO during May and June 2017 at Upplands Motor Stockholm AB car dealership in Sweden, located on the highway between Stockholm city centre and Arlanda airport.
AQMesh was selected to be included in the 2017 Parliamentary Review as an industry leader within the environmental technology sector.
Cleves School in Weybridge, Surrey (UK) has used AQMesh to measure pollution at the primary school’s entrance. The project, led by Dr. Edward Salter over the school’s summer term, aimed to understand exposure of the children (aged 7-11) to dangerous pollutant gases, with particular interest in the levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and ozone (O3).
AQMesh has been measuring ozone (O3) using small sensors since 2011 and the readings from the latest generation electrochemical sensor, using AQMesh v4.2.3 processing, as compared to co-located certified reference readings, consistently show an R2 of over 0.9 with an accuracy ±10ppb (20µg/m3).
At the IAPSC in May 2017, Professor Rod Jones of the University of Cambridge presented his case study on large scale deployment of sensors, which included showing how AQMesh can be used to discriminate between local sources of pollution and regional sources of pollution.
AQMesh is currently in use in Nicaragua, monitoring air quality in communities living near Masaya volcano. The six AQMesh pods have been used to show variations in volcanogenic SO2 and PM levels at different times and at different locations across the area.
Recent co-location comparison trials using the latest AQMesh processing (v4.2.3) have further proven AQMesh performance with impressive R2 values in excess of O.8 and 0.9 for NO2 in Benelux, Slovakia and Spain.
Leading small sensor air quality monitor, AQMesh, has recently been shown to work alongside passive samplers and air quality models, as well as complementing reference station networks. A recent study shows AQMesh calibration against diffusion tubes and two 2017 conferences have highlighted the potential of such systems used in an air quality network.
When three AQMesh pods and four NO2 diffusion tubes were co-located against a reference station, the diffusion tube readings were so consistent with the reference average reading for the period that the diffusion tube average could be used to apply a slope correction to AQMesh data.
On 9th April The Sunday Times reported that employers have been told they are legally obliged to protect their staff from diesel fumes — and could be sued if workers develop cancer later in life.
Smart city projects pursue the vision of instrumenting a city with a large number of measurement ‘nodes’ and distributing this information to a range of stakeholders. But at that point different priorities emerge: IT teams are attracted by how readily data can be integrated and communicated whilst air quality professionals focus on how meaningful the air quality readings are.
Smart city projects increasingly seek to include air quality measurements. If city authorities and the public are being asked to act based on air quality readings they must be credible. Whilst cheap sensors may offer easily integrated readings, they offer poor value for money if the information they produce cannot be trusted by the public, smart city project managers and stakeholders.
At the RSC AAMG event on ‘Air Quality Monitoring: Evolving Issues and New Technologies’ Professor Rod Jones of the University of Cambridge presented a paper showing very encouraging results.
An AQMesh pod used in the recent Citi-Sense project in Norway was returned to us at the end of the project, and we were surprised at the condition.
A new generation of air quality monitors is now being offered to provide localised, real-time air quality readings – but the potential benefit is only just starting to be realised.
The emergence of sensors capable of measuring the gases and particles that make up air pollution, especially in cities and industrial areas, has driven many academic studies which evaluate the sensors and compare performance against reference methodology.
AQMesh has an impressive collection of global users and performance results measuring ambient air quality in applications ranging from traffic planning and urban hotspots to industrial fence line monitoring, building ventilation management, or environmental lobbying.
Situated in the south west of Wales (UK), in a largely rural area bordering the Brecon Beacons, Carmarthenshire’s air quality is predominantly good. However, there are areas of concern where major roads pass through some of the County’s larger towns, including Llanelli, Carmarthen and Llandeilo, where air quality is dominated by the effects of road traffic.