Particle Flower
Identifying urban pockets of bad air
Many cities and regions have air quality sensors that record air quality data for a wider region. While this is certainly useful, it is not nearly specific enough especially for a city like New York where the air one breathes at home can potentially vary widely depending upon which street one lives on. In an urban context, where sources of pollution can be much closer to residences, sometimes even right outside the window, a regional air quality reading is less relevant.
The goal of this project is to show planners and decision-makers where air quality interventions are needed and to start a wider conversation on how the street in which one lives has a large impact on the air that one breathes. This can be done by monitoring the air quality outside hundreds of apartment windows and making the resulting air quality information easily accessible.
Particle Flower is an at home air quality sensor that passively but continuously monitors the air quality outside your window. The small device is designed to be located on the average apartment windowsill and provide real-time information in the form of an LED indicator light on the PM2.5 level.
To make this project feasible at a larger scale, small, low-cost air quality sensors have to be able to detect and react to small changes in air quality. The Honeywell HPM Particle Sensor, a small and low-cost sensor that measures PM2.5 levels, was used and tested in various scenarios to understand its accuracy and sensitivity.
The implications of these findings as well as details on developing a wider network of sensors can be found in the final report:
