SHORT COMMUNICATION: Indoor air quality monitoring in urban areas using Smart Sensing Technology

Recently, indoor air quality has attracted the attention of policymakers and researchers as a critical issue like that of external air pollution. Indoor air quality is more important as people spend time longer indoors than outdoors. Indoor environments are closed compared to external environments providing less opportunity for the pollutants to dilute. The emissions contain many substances that are harmful to humans when exposed for a prolonged period or to certain levels of concentration. Internet of Things (IoT) technology is best and low-cost method of measuring air pollution. This paper proposes an IoT technology for an indoor air quality monitoring system to monitor urban homes. The pollution level observed in the Kodungayur (location 8) and Manali (location 9) exceeds the standards. Maximum outdoor pollution observed value of CO, SO2, NO2 and PM.25 are 9.2, 0.135, 0.102 and 0.215 respectively. Similarly, the indoor pollution levels are varying from 10% to 15 % lesser than that of the outdoor pollution values. The percentage of error varied from – 2.94% to + 2.94%. The percentage of error is within ± 5%, which shows its robustness. Outdoor air pollution does not influence indoor air pollution is the result of this study.