New air quality sensor proving its worth in London.

The new AQY Micro Air Quality Monitor from Aeroqual, which is available from Campbell Associates, is designed for ambient air quality measurements and provides a practical solution to monitoring projects in urban areas. Set up as a single device or as a network of monitors, the AQY reports key pollutants in real-time. The system focuses on PM2.5, PM10, NO2 and ozone, because these are the main pollutants closely associated with road traffic emissions and known to be detrimental to the health of people living in urban areas.

The London Borough of Southwark have a permanent reference station which monitors ambient air quality at Elephant and Castle close to a busy intersection in an urban environment.  To test the data collected by the AQY monitor, 3 units were positioned on the roof of the permanent station, and the systems were run in parallel for one week.  In the graph the data from the permanent reference station is represented by the red line, and the green line is the data from the AQY monitors.  The AQY monitors tracked the reference station measurements almost perfectly, clearly demonstrating that the AQY does deliver accurate and scientifically credible measurements.