As part of SMUBS engagement with the EO industry, a local workshop on Athens was organized on 18 September 2018, as a back-to-back meeting during the kick-off of the national funded project EMISSION. Views were exchanged on the current capacities/activities of the private sector, in the domain of EO, smart cities and air quality. In particular, the state-of-the-art mid- and low-cost sensors for AQ measurements was the central topic of the discussion among 5 representatives from companies and 6 from the research community.
Sensors should be able to monitor the conventional gaseous pollutants (O3, NOx, CO), as well as ΡΜ1, PM2.5, PM10, BC (black carbon), according to EC standards. In parallel, the basic meteorological parameters (T, RH, P) should also be monitored.
QA/QC procedures for the sensors can be facilitated through a prototype method supported by a super-site (conventional, high-quality in situ sensors.
A supporting software system is necessary for the calculation –among others- of a complex air quality index, to be used as the main visualization product of the solution.
Technical issues and requirements to be considered: Choice of the hosting IoT platform, data transmission options, sampling mode options, time distance between measurement and transmission, power and energy supplies, installation manners, portability of the sensors, interconnection among sensors, data logger and platform.
A scientific approach should be employed to indicate the positioning of the monitoring sites of an AQ city network, incorporating the needs of the regional/local authorities and the research communities and criteria for sampling representativeness and adequacy.
