Asian Journal of Atmospheric Environment, Vol. 13, No.

1, 30-38, 2019
Open Access

Vol. 13, No. 1, pp. 30-38, March 2019

doi: https://doi.org/10.5572/ajae.2019.13.1.030
ISSN (Online) 2287-1160, ISSN (Print) 1976-6912

BAQ Special Issue

Development of a Smart Air Quality Monitoring System and

its Operation
Yaeseul Sung, Seungmin Lee, Yeonkyung Kim, Hanbai Park*

ABSTRACT Indoor air quality control becomes a critical role in protecting human life
Korea Environmental Technology Co., due to a significant increase in indoor living time with industrial development. However, air
Ltd., 12 Oncheoncheon-ro 319St., purifier and ventilation systems are installed in many indoor places, and qualities of air are
Dongnae-gu, Busan, 47887, Republic
of Korea
not guaranteed without effective monitoring systems. In this study, we developed a smart
indoor air quality monitoring device, measuring components of PM10, PM2.5, PM1, CO, CO2,
*Corresponding author. VOCs, temperature and humidity. The smart air quality monitoring system is commutated
Tel: +82-51-555-6511 with a developed smartphone application using short and long distance communication
E-mail: [email protected]
modules. The smart application basically provides air quality information (daily, monthly,
Received: 19 September 2018 yearly), air management methods, and emerging environmental issues. For the system ver-
Revised: 28 December 2018 ification, we tested the developed air quality monitoring system with other reliable mea-
Accepted: 6 March 2019
suring devices. As results, the gaps between our developed system and other reliable mea-
suring devices are PM10 (±4%), PM2.5 (±4%), CO (±1%), CO2 (±1%), VOCs (±2%), tempera-
ture (±1%) and humidity (±2%). We found that the developed smart air quality monitor-
ing system is sufficiently reliable comparing to other measuring devices. Therefore, the
smart air quality monitoring system would help improve indoor air quality in real time and
can be used for future air quality prediction.
KEY WORDS ‌Smart air quality monitoring system, Air quality sensors, Wireless communica-
tion, Indoor air quality, Smart device application

1. INTRODUCTION
Alongside economic development and increasing environmental pollution,
indoor air qualities have become one of the world’s largest environmental problems.
People spend approximately 90 percent of their time indoors such as homes, gyms,
schools and work places, where the concentrations of some pollutants are often 2 to
5 times higher than typical outdoor concentrations (U.S. EPA, 1989). The Sick
Building Syndrome (SBS) is a recent disease of sleepiness, difficult concentrating,
cough, sore throat, chest tightness, eye focusing problems and nasal irritation due to
indoor air qualities. Meier et al. (2015) investigated indoor and outdoor air qualities
of PM10, PM2.5, NO2 and the result indicates that home characteristics are signifi-
cantly related to outdoor and indoor pollution. Gil et al. (1995) studied outdoor
pollution impact on indoor air qualities and resulted that indoor concentrations of

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www.asianjae.org This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.
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properly cited.
 Smart Air Quality Monitoring System

CO were higher and PM5 concentrations were similar cessfully performed and measured temperature and
indoor and outdoor. Many studies have reported the greenhouse gas concentrations. Jiang et al. (2013) devel-
association between exposures to indoor pollutants. CO oped a real time indoor CO2 sensing system and success-
is toxic, and short-term exposure to high CO levels fully tested its reliability. Kashid et al. (2016) proposed a
indoor can be lethal (Raub et al., 2000). Asthma, allergic real time indoor air quality system equipped with CO2,
and respiratory symptoms among children in school and NO2, SO2, VOCs, dust, temperature and humidity. Abra-
daycare centers often occur due to polluted indoor air ham et al. (2014) developed a low-cost indoor air quality
(Breysse et al., 2010; Wu et al., 2009). Vicente et al. monitoring wireless sensor network system using Ardui-
(2017) found that indoor PM10 concentrations were no, XBee modules, and CO2, VOC, temperature and
twice higher than outdoor PM10 concentrations even humidity sensors. They demonstrated the performance
with two installed ventilated systems. Indoor air qualities and usefulness of the system by comparing measurement
are largely dependent on building usages and ventilation results of their system and a professional-grade air quali-
systems of the buildings. Liu et al. (2004) investigated ty measurement device.
PM10 and PM2.5 in various residential and commercial In this paper, we present an indoor air quality monitor-
buildings and found that restaurants, dormitories and ing system equipped with air quality sensors, wireless
classrooms contained more PM10 and PM2.5 than super- communication modules, displays and smartphone
markets, computer rooms, offices and libraries. Long applications. The developed system is capable of mea-
term exposures to poor air qualities are likely to cause suring PM10, PM2.5, PM1, VOCs, CO, CO2, temperature
increased short and long term health problems particu- and humidity in real time. The data from the developed
larly for vulnerable groups such as children, young air quality system is forwarded to the smartphone appli-
adults, and the elderly or those suffering chronic respira- cation, then to the cloud sever by using wireless commu-
tory or cardiovascular diseases (Adel et al., 2016; Simoni nications as Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and Lora. In addition, we
et al., 2015). Indoor pollutants such as ozone, particulate conveniently designed a smartphone monitoring appli-
matter, nitrogen dioxide, tobacco smoke, sulfur dioxide, cation for providing the information of indoor and out-
carbon monoxide and dampness can cause and exacer- door air qualities, pollution warnings, adequate actions
bate human health ranging from acute and chronic respi- and weather conditions.
ratory symptoms to cancer (Vicente et al., 2004). Among
these symptoms, the three most common ones are dry
eyes, dry throats and headache (Liu et al., 2004). Some 2. METHODOLOGY
studies revealed various indoor air contaminants includ-
ing odorous, non-odorous gases, vapors, and particles 2. 1 ‌Process of Smart Air Quality Monitoring
(Ghorani-Azam et al., 2016). They suggested that several System
toxic and potentially toxic substances could be responsi- The overall system architecture of the developed smart
ble for health effects (Liu et al., 2004). air quality monitoring system is shown in Fig. 1. The
There is a growing demand on appropriate air moni- main components of the system include a sensor part, a
toring systems while providing suitable air quality infor- wireless communication part and a smart application
mation in time to individuals, which can help reduce part. The sensor part is consist of a dust sensor, a carbon
damages by polluted air. However, most air quality mon- monoxide sensor, a carbon dioxide sensor, a volatile
itoring systems are still expensive, time-consuming, and organic compounds sensor, and a temperature and
often unable to provide air quality information in time. humidity sensor. The sensor part measures PM10, PM2.5,
Combination of the internet of things (IOT) and sensor PM1, VOCs, CO, CO2, temperature and humidity, and
technologies enhance the development of small, low- then the measured data is forwarded to the smart appli-
cost, and real time air quality monitoring systems. Low cation by a short range communication device (Blue-
cost air quality monitors often implement real-time tooth, Wi-Fi) or a long range communication device
monitoring and visualization for smartphones and tab- (Lora). In the application, the display shows the mea-
lets to help inform the users (Hasenfratz et al., 2012). sured data to the user, and then the measured data in the
Lambebo et al. (2014) reported that a real time monitor- application and transmitted to the server, which provides
ing system composed of CO, CO2 and CH4 sensors suc- warnings and hourly, daily, yearly data to the application.

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 Asian Journal of Atmospheric Environment, Vol. 13, No. 1, 30-38, 2019

Fig. 1. System architecture of the developed smart air quality monitoring system.

2. 2 H‌ ardware of Smart Air Quality Monitoring transmit it to the server. Finally, the server provides the
System monitoring data, warnings, and adequate actions to all
The hardware of the developed smart air quality users.
device is divided into a sensor part and a communication The air quality application is composed of an indoor
part. air quality screen, an outdoor air quality screen, a weath-
The sensor part is composed of a PM sensor, a CO2 er screen and an environmental information screen. The
sensor, a CO sensor, a VOCs sensor, and a temperature indoor air quality screen provides the indoor air quality
and humidity sensor. The PM sensor (PM 2008M) is data measured by the developed smart air quality device.
able to detect PM10, PM2.5, and PM1 by light scattering The outdoor air quality screen displays outdoor air qual-
methods. The CO2 (CM-1106) sensor detects carbon ities from Air Korea Open api. The weather screen pro-
dioxide from 0 ppm to 2000 ppm by non-dispersive vides weather conditions from Korea Meteorological
infrared absorption methods. The CO sensor (EC-750) Administration open api. In the environmental informa-
detects carbon monoxide ranging from 0 to 1000 ppm tion screen, issues related to the indoor environment are
by electrochemical methods. The VOCs (FIS4220- provided and updated by the sever operator.
AQ1) sensor measures ranging from 0 to 10 ppm using
electrochemical methods. The temperature and humidi-
ty sensor (SHT30-DIS-B) measures temperature from 3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
-40°C to 125°C and humidity from 0% to 100%.
In the communication part, the Bluetooth and Wi-Fi Overall structure of the developed smart air quality
module (ESP-WROOM 32) is installed for a short dis- system is divided into hardware and software production
tance communication and Lora module (LOM 202A) is parts. After the configuration of both parts, reliability
installed for a long distance communication. Table 1 tests of the smart air quality system were performed for
indicates the detailed characteristics of the used sensors. proper operating verification.

2. 3 S‌ oftware of Smart Air Quality Monitoring 3. 1 Fabrication of Smart Air Quality System
System As shown In Fig. 3, the smart air quality monitoring
Functions of the smartphone air quality application system contains the dust sensor, the CO2 sensor, the CO
are to obtain the monitoring data from the smart air sensor, the VOCs sensor, and the temperature & humid-
quality device, to clearly display it to the user and to ity sensor. The dust sensor is a PM2008M laser particle

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 Smart Air Quality Monitoring System

Table 1. Sensor and Module characteristics in the smart air quality monitoring device.
Sensors/Module Characteristics
Method: Light scattering, Size: 48 * 41.5 * 12.9 mm
Particle matter sensor (PM 2008M) PM1.0, PM2.5 and PM10 Range: 0 to 1,000 μg/m3
Resolution: ±1 μg/m3, Accuracy: ±10-25%
Method: Electrochemical, Size: Ø20 * 16.5 mm
CO sensor (SS2128)
Range: 0 to 2000 ppm, Resolution: 0.5 ppm, Accuracy: ±5%
Method: Non-dispersive infrared absorption, Size: 33 * 19.7 * 8.9 mm
CO2 sensor (CM-1106)
Range: 0 to 2000 ppm, Resolution: 1 ppm, Accuracy: ±5%
Method: Electrochemical, Size: 14 * 22.6 mm
VOCs sensor (FIS4220-AQ1)
Range: 0 to 10 ppm, Resolution: 1 ppm, Accuracy: ±5%
Method: Electrochemical, Size: 2.5 * 2.5 * 0.9 mm
Temperature and Humidity sensor (SHT30-DIS-B) -40℃ to 125℃, Accuracy: ±0.3℃
0% to 100%, Accuracy: ±3%
Type : EMVEDDED SMD
Frequency Range : 902.3 MHz-927.5 MHz
SK Telecom LoRa Module (LOM 202A)
Down/Up Link : Max DL 5.4 Kbps/UL5.4 Kbps
Communication Distance: 1-10 km
Wi-Fi : 802.11 b/g/n/d/e/i/k/r (802.11 n up to 150 Mbps)
Bluetooth : V4.2 BR/EDR and BLE Specification
Wi-Fi-BT-BLE MCU Module (ESP-WROOM 32)
Frequency Range : 2.4-2.5 GHz
Communication Distance: 10-50 m

Fig. 2. Smartphone air quality application (Sequence: indoor, outdoor, weather).

sensor module, which use light scattering principle to perature from -10°C up to 50°C, at humidity from 0 to
measure and calculate PM1, PM2.5, and PM10 with unit 92% RH, and with 1 second response time. The CO sen-
volume on the air. It works with DC 5 V±0.1 V, at tem- sor is an SS2128 electrochemical sensor, which works

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 Asian Journal of Atmospheric Environment, Vol. 13, No. 1, 30-38, 2019

(a) Picture of the smart air quality monitoring system (back side)

(b) Picture of the smart air quality monitoring system (front side)

Fig. 3. Hardware of the smart air quality monitoring system.

with DC 5 V, at temperature from -20°C up to 50°C, at communication modules, display screen, and lithium ion
humidity from 15% to 90% RH, and with 25 seconds battery are installed. The short distance communication
response time. The CO2 sensor is a CM1106 non-dis- module is an ESP32 WROOM module supporting both
persive infrared sensor, which works with DC 5 V±0.1 Wifi and Bluetooth, which works with DC 2.2 V-3.6 V,
V, at temperature from -10°C up to 50°C, at humidity at temperature from -40°C up to 85°C, and with 0.4 sec-
from 0 to 95% RH, and with 120 seconds response time. ond response time. The long distance communication
The VOCs sensor is a FIS4220-AQ1 semiconductor module is a LOM202A module, which works with DC
sensor, which works with DC 3.3V±0.5%, at tempera- 3.0 V-3.6 V and at temperature from -30°C up to 70°C.
ture from -10°C up to 50°C, at humidity from 10 to 90% The used display is a 2.8 inch LCD with 128 × 64 pixels.
RH, and with 2 seconds response time. The temperature The interference wall is constructed due to minimize
and humidity sensor is an SHT30-DIS-B digital sensor mutual interference between sensors and other units
which works with DC 3.3 V±0.5%, at temperature from such as the display, the battery and the communication
-40°C up to 125°C, at humidity from 0 to 100% RH, modules.
and with 2 seconds response time. As shown in Fig. 3-b, The output screen presents dust, CO2, CO, and VOCs

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 Smart Air Quality Monitoring System

Fig. 4. Flow diagram for the application process.

concentrations, and temperature, and humidity readings. implemented to provide information according to the
The pollution value is basically set according to the deteriorated indoor and outdoor air qualities based on
WHO indoor air quality standard (WHO, 2010). When the registered user̓s location information.
the set standard values are exceeded, red alarms display
to inform the exceeding pollution limits. 3. 3 Verification of Air Quality Monitoring System
Real time measured data in the smart air quality moni- A reliability test of the smart air quality system was
toring system are forwarded to the smartphone applica- performed for the verification of the proper operation. In
tion, and then the data are transmitted to the server. The the test, concentrations of PM 10, PM 2.5, CO, CO 2,
sever stores all the data for a future prediction. VOCs, and readings of temperature and humidity were
obtained for 2 hours with our developed smart air quali-
3. 2 Fabrication of Air Quality Application ty system named “Amore” and other reliable measuring
The air quality monitoring application, for which the devices. PM10 and PM2.5 were measured by Amore and
flow diagram of the application process is shown in Fig. BR-AIR-82K from Bramc Co., Ltd. CO was measured by
4, was created using Android̓s list and scroll views. In Amore and testo 317-3 from Testo Co., Ltd. CO2 was
order to acquire many indoor air quality information, a tested by Amore and TSI-7525 from TSI Co., Ltd. VOCs
data queue was constructed and used for a packet pro- was tested by Amore and Phocheck Tiger from Senko
cessing. An open library was created to display data plots Co., Ltd. Temperature and humidity were measured by
with hours, days and months. A notification center is Amore and testo-608-H1 from Testo Co., Ltd. The
used to display alarms and warnings using a basic alarm results were shown in Fig. 5.
sound of Android by the set values. A local search func- In the reliability test, it was observed that differences
tion by using api of Daum map to display indoor air of Amore and other reliable devices were only ±4% for
quality of maps on the screen. Weather information was PM10 and PM2.5, ±1% for CO, ±1% for CO2, ±2% for
used from an open api of Meteorological Agency. A basic VOCs, ±1% for temperature and ±2% for humidity.
server is built on a general computer to store user infor- Thus, it is found that the developed air quality monitor-
mation and user air quality data. When users connect to ing system “Amore” can produce reliable data as other
the screen, the open api is called to provide information reliable devices do.
in the near area and near time zone. The push message is

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 Asian Journal of Atmospheric Environment, Vol. 13, No. 1, 30-38, 2019

(a) PM10 result by Amore and BR-AIR-82K (b) PM2.5 result by Amore and BR-AIR-82K

(c) CO result by Amore and testo 317-3 (d) CO2 result by Amore and TSI-7525

(e) VOCs result by Amore and Phocheck Tiger (f) Temperature result by Amore and testo-608-H1

(g) Humidity result by Amore and testo-608-H1

Fig. 5. Reliability test result by Amore and other reliable devices.

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 Smart Air Quality Monitoring System

4. CONCLUSION town Santiago (Chile). Revista Medica Chile 123, 411-425.

Ghorani-Azam, A., Riahi-Zanjani, B., Balali-Mood, M. (2016).
The developed smart air quality monitoring system is Effects of air pollution on human health and practical mea-
to measure several indoor air pollution levels and to sures for prevention in Iran. Journal of Research in Medical
Sciences: the official journal of Isfahan University of Medical
inform the users about pollution information. Therefore, Sciences 21, 65.
the users could minimize the contact time from the pol- Hasenfratz, D., Saukh, O., Sturzenegger, S., Thiele, L. (2012)
luted air and be less exposed to pollution damage. Participatory Air Pollution Monitoring Using Smartphones,
This study developed the PM1, PM2.5, PM10, CO, CO2, 2nd International Workshop on Mobile Sensing, 1-5.
VOCs, temperature and humidity monitoring system to Jiang, Y., Li, K., Piedrahita, R., Xiang, Y., Tian, L., Mansata, O.,
Lv, Q., Dick, R.P., Hannigan, M., Shang, L. (2013) User-
create safe work environment and living environment. Centric Indoor Air-Quality Monitoring on Mobile Devices.
For the appropriate communication to the smart appli- Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence
cation, a short distance communication (Bluetooth, 11-30.
Wi-Fi) and a long distance communication (Lora) were Kashid, A., Ankalgi, P., Jamdade, K., Sable, S., Shinde, S. (2016)
installed. The communication sequence is the transfer of Real Time Indoor Air Quality Monitoring System. Interna-
tional Journal of Innovative Research in Electrical, Electron-
data from the smart air monitoring device to the applica- ics, Instrumentation and Control Engineering 4, 36-38.
tion and finally to the server. The gained data from the Korea Meteorological Administration open api (2018, July, 15),
developed device is stored in the cloud sever which can http://www.kma.go.kr/
be used for the future air quality prediction. For the veri- Lambebo, A., Haghani, S. (2014) A wireless sensor network for
fication of the system, the data transmission from the air Environmental Monitoring of Greenhouse Gases. In Pro-
ceedings of the ASEE Zone I Conference,1-4
quality monitoring device was checked and found that Liu, Y., Chen, R., Shen, X., Mao, X. (2004) Wintertime indoor
all data were comparable those from other reliable devic- air levels of PM10, PM2.5 and PM1 at public places and their
es. contributions to TSP. Environment International 30, 189-
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only significantly reduce indoor air pollution exposure of Meier, R., Eelens, M., Phuleria, H.C., Ineichen, A., Corradi, E.,
Davey, M., Fierz, M., Ducret-Stich, RE., Aquilera, I.,
people but also directly or indirectly reduce air pollution Schindler, C., Rochat, T., Probst-Hensch, N., Tsai, M.Y.,
damage by communicating monitoring data and coun- Kunzli, N. (2015) Differences in indoor versus outdoor con-
termeasure methods. The development of this technolo- centrations of ultrafine particles, PM2.5, PM absorbance and
gy will bring economic, social and environmental bene- NO2 in Swiss homes. Journal of Exposure Science & Envi-
fits to the development of smart indoor air systems by ronmental Epidemiology 25, 499-505.
Nazaroff, W.W. (2013) Exploring the consequences of climate
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