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Google Straps Aclima Sensors To Street View Cars To Map Air Pollution
Eloking writes: Google and a San Francisco-based Aclima have equipped Google's Street View cars with environmental sensors in order to map urban air quality. The project aims to create high resolution maps of air quality across cities by measuring carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, particulate matter, Volatile Organic Compounds, and other pollutants. “We have a profound opportunity to understand how cities live and breathe in an entirely new way by integrating Aclima’s mobile sensing platform with Google Maps and Street View cars,” said Davida Herzl, co-founder and CEO of Aclima. “With more than half of the world’s population now living in cities, environmental health is becoming increasingly important to quality of life. Today we’re announcing the success of our integration test with Google, which lays the foundation for generating high resolution maps of air quality in cities.”
Don't expect these sensors to be attached to the Google buses, as Googlers are part of the solution, not part of the problem.
further, co2 isnt' an an air pollutant. it doesn't cause ozone, smog, bronchitis, heart disease or cancer. we all inhale it and exhale it every day. it's the new hotness but completely irrelevant when talking about air quality.
I would put air quality monitors at schools nationwide. that would be very relevant. also an effective way to drive policy, think of the children.
In China, you can improve the report by smoking a cigarette 1 foot away from the sensor.
Hoping to be able to follow them in my '68 Dodge Polara convertible. Is the sensor in the front or back? Want to make sure they get the full effect.
I love watching the gas gauge move down on acceleration!
To Copy from One is Plagiarism; To Copy from Many is Research.
It is no more political reason then it would be political to measure the amount of rain that is falling.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
The CO2 monitoring is useful for finding major sources of LOCAL pollution, but, it really can not deal well with large 'Whiffs' of it.
OTOH, OCO2 is already showing where the REAL CO2 comes from, and is making a mockery of the numbers that the far left comes up with. Keep in mind that CO2 numbers are predicated on various items:
1) the first is via monitoring. That works well if you have monitors all over the nation. This is used heavily for doing calcs in the western nations. However, when monitors are NOT all over the nations, then you have an issue.
2) calculations based on gov. supplied numbers. This is what is used in most of the world, in particular, for China. THis fails since nearly ALL govs. CHEAT on these numbers.
3) Space based monitoring. OCO2 is now showing that numbers are wrong.
So, while I would not fully trust the numbers from Google, they will give an idea of where bad emissions are from. OTOH, Sats will give a better idea of which area CO2 is coming from, as well as being sucked up.
Thankfully, OCO3 is now being worked on, and will give a much better idea of where CO2 emissions are coming from within locations.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
further, co2 isnt' an an air pollutant. it doesn't cause ozone, smog, bronchitis, heart disease or cancer.
But increased levels of CO2 actually found in (some relatively extreme) workplaces in the USA do have significant negative health effects! Occupational CO2 exposure limits have been set in the United States at 0.5% (5000 ppm) for an 8-hour period.[88] At this level of CO2, International Space Station crew experienced headaches, lethargy, mental slowness, emotional irritation, and sleep disruption.[89] Studies in animals at 0.5% CO2 have demonstrated kidney calcification and bone loss after 8 weeks of exposure.[90] Another study of humans exposed in 2.5 hour sessions demonstrated significant effects on cognitive abilities at concentrations as low as 0.1% (1000ppm) CO2 likely due to CO2 induced increases in cerebral blood flow.[91] [...] Higher CO2 concentrations are associated with occupant health, comfort and performance degradation. ASHRAE Standard 62.1â"2007 ventilation rates may result in indoor levels up to 2,100 ppm above ambient outdoor conditions. Thus if the outdoor ambient is 400 ppm, indoor concentrations may reach 2,500 ppm with ventilation rates that meet this industry consensus standard. Concentrations in poorly ventilated spaces can be found even higher than this (range of 3,000 or 4,000). Keep in mind that levels under 5,000 ppm can cause negative health effects; that's just the level at which our government says you have to do something about it.
It is highly relevant what CO2 levels are like in our cities, and the things you said are completely irrelevant to that fact.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Nice attempted derail. Why is CO2 a "pollutant" while O2 and N2 are not?
It is no more political reason then it would be political to measure the amount of rain that is falling.
Utter nonsense. Even if you assume that CO2 is a "pollutant" (and that's a pretty huge assumption not backed by actual science), it wouldn't have any effect locally unless large areas were covered with hundreds of thousands of PPM. And then it would be easy to tell, because -- the only serious local effect possible -- people and animals would be keeling over en masse.
Rain, on the other hand, has immediate and very local effects.
And as for
pouring into the atmosphere at a rate of more than 100x what nature produces
... man, go back to elementary school. That hasn't happened, isn't happening, and isn't going to happen.
Yes it is. As the NAS explains on page 6 here:
"In nature, CO2 is exchanged continually between the atmosphere, plants and animals through photosynthesis, respiration, and decomposition, and between the atmosphere and ocean through gas exchange. A very small amount of CO2 (roughly 1% of the emission rate from fossil fuel combustion) is also emitted in volcanic eruptions. This is balanced by an equivalent amount that is removed by chemical weathering of rocks."
So natural CO2 emissions are balanced, and our fossil fuel emissions are roughly 100x faster than volcanic emissions. That's why "actual science" shows that our current CO2 emissions rate is unprecedented over the last 300 million years.
And if you read the rest of that NAS document, you'd discover that "actual science" shows that our unprecedentedly rapid CO2 emissions are a cause for concern.
fine. i bet the co2 level outside at street level is never more than 10% higher than up in the sky.
I prefer data to what you're willing to bet on. Luckily, someone is going to go forth and gather it regardless of what you think, and we'll find out whether you're right or not.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"