Air is a vital life-supporting substance and its quality has a significant impact on human health. With the arrival of winter, the atmosphere is dominated by sinking air currents and pollutants are not easily diffused. Palas® has extensive experience in monitoring urban fine dust pollution and is equally familiar with monitoring air quality in severe weather. Particle monitoring expert Palas® offers the AQ Guard Smart Grid Monitor for Ambient Air Quality and the Fidas® Single Particle Aerosol Particle Distribution Spectrometer. Both are specialized instruments for air quality monitoring, providing monitoring support for measuring aerosol particles in the air.
Measure air pollution levels with the hazards of smoking
Airborne PM2.5 particles have a particle size of only 2.5 microns. Because these particles are small enough, they can enter the bloodstream deep into the lungs and cause heart disease, stroke, lung cancer and asthma, endangering people’s health. At the same time, people know well about the health risks and hazards of smoking. A leading environmental agency has designed an application that provides insight into the health effects of air pollution. This application links air quality to the amount of smoking and compares air pollution with the harm caused by the act of smoking. The aim is to help people to understand the health effects of air pollution. The results are vivid and compelling, and the situation of air pollution in different areas is available via the application.
For example, in a one-day monitoring, the air pollution level in Hainan is equivalent to smoking 0.4 cigarettes a day, and the system indicates that the current air quality is satisfactory, there is little or no risk of air pollution, and people can enjoy their outdoor activities. Whereas in Baoding the air pollution level is equivalent to smoking 9 cigarettes a day. The system warns that the current major air pollutant PM2.5 may affect health and people should reduce outdoor activities, especially vulnerable people. This shows that air pollution is an unpromising situation in some cities and people need to pay attention to the damage caused by air pollution. If you also want to check the air pollution level measured by the amount of smoking in your city, please click here for more details about APP.
Comparison of air pollution measured by the amount of smoking in one day in Hainan and Baoding
Aerosol monitoring in severe weather
For different causes of air pollution, Palas®, a monitoring specialist in aerosols and particulate, brings air quality monitoring solutions. La Palma, part of Spain’s Islas Canarias, experienced a 50-year volcanic eruption in September 2021. Less than half a year later, in February this year, it experienced another dust storm caused by strong seasonal winds. The natural disasters that followed have had a serious impact on local air and people’s lives. Palas® responded immediately and dispatched staff to the island to install 10 AQ Guard Smart Aerosol Spectrometers. In the face of this dust storm, the AQ Guard Smart will once again provide Spanish authorities with real-time monitoring data to help them make decisions and inform the public. Click here to see more applications of AQ Guard Smart in response to natural disasters.
PSD phase diagram of volcanic ash and Saharan dust monitored by AQ Guard Smart
Reliable Palas® monitors
Palas® stable air quality monitors provide reliable, continuous and flexible measurements of particle concentration and distribution, being able to identify the causes of particle pollution and predict its dispersion. They can be used for mobile walk-away monitoring, particle emission dispersion studies and monitoring of safe working conditions. In addition, they are also helpful in monitoring the air quality at roadside locations, both temporarily or in a long-term, construction sites or industrial plants to help people face a variety of air pollution challenges.
AQ Guard Smart Grid Monitor for Ambient Air Quality
Optional data cloud platform, plug and play, real-time viewing of hotspot data:
AQ Guard Smart is a robust aerosol spectrometer for ambient air. It uses the measurement principle of optical scattered light measurement on single particles based on the technology of the EN 16450 certified Fidas® 200. Can be upgraded with a gas sensor package (SO2, CO, NO2, O3) and thus offers optimum options for evaluating the air quality. AQ Guard Smart can be operated over longer periods without recalibration. Deviations in the particle size determination and, therefore drifts of the PM values, are determined by a specific analysis of the particle size distribution and displayed and reported when a tolerance threshold is exceeded as part of the self-monitoring. AQ Guard Smart transmits measurement data via Palas® MyAtmosphere; when operating alone, the system can be operated by an external battery with or without solar support.
Advantages
· Technology based on the certified Fidas® 200 series (EN16450 and MCERTS), Easy and fast installation
· Configuration via Wi-Fi hotspot, remote, external touchpad
· Communication via GPRS / 3G / 4G / Ethernet / Wi-Fi
· Expandable with weather station / external battery / solar
· Simultaneous measurement of Cn, PM1, PM5, PM4, PM10 with high temporal resolution
· Particle measurement range from 0.175 – 20,000 nm up to 100 mg/m³ mass concentration or 20,000 particle/cm³ (single particle analysis)
· Continuous and simultaneous real-time measurement in second-by-second resolution
· Visualization of the measured data in real time and their course
· Data and parameters can be subsequently evaluated with Palas® PDAnalyze software
· Real-time transfer of measured data without post-processing or adjustment
Applications
Industry:
· Process of production
· Bulk material handling (mixing, unloading, storage, packaging, etc.)
· Factory Boundary Monitoring
· Construction site: road, railway, demolition site
· Buildings: schools, kindergartens, hospitals, hotels, offices, public service buildings
· Residential buildings near construction sites or other polluted areas
· Public transport: airports, railway stations, tram and metro stations, cruise ships, cabins, e.g. on trams, trains
Fidas® Single Particle Aerosol Distribution Spectrometers
Palas® Fidas® Single Particle Aerosol Distribution Spectrometer is an aerosol spectrometer developed for the control of air pollution. It continuously analyzes the presence of fine dust particles in ambient air. The measurement size ranges 180 nm – 18 µm. It calculates PM10 and PM2.5 emission values. Also, it calculates and records PM1, PM4, PMtot, particle number concentration Cn and particle size distribution. Thus, information about fine dust particles is provided by the counting and the principle of single particle measurement.
Advantages
· Certified according to TÜV Rheinland Germany and MCERTS UK
· Continuous and simultaneous real-time measurement of multiple PM values
· Additional information on the basis of particle number concentration
· Adjustable time resolution from over 1s to 24h
· Cloud zone via Palas® server for worldwide data retrieval
· Low maintenance, low consumables
Applications
· Regulatory pollution control in monitoring networks
· Long-term studies of particles
· Mobile navigation monitoring
· Emission dispersion studies
Palas® will arrange a series of online webinars both in English and Chinese for Ambient air quality continuous automatic monitoring system, SMPS scanning mobility particle size spectrometer, Promo® aerosol spectrometer, Aerosol generator and Dilution system, ISO 16890 filter media test rig-MFP 3000 G, ISO 29463-3 HEPA/ULPA filter media test rig-MFP Nano plus 4000, ISO 17536 oil mist separator filtration performance test rig-HMT 1000, as well as many other aerosol test solutions. You are welcome to register for the conference and will be informed of the webinar information as soon as possible!