Measuring Air Quality with ESP32 & Arduino

Sep 23, 2022  Sensors - Sensing the outside world

Use an ESP32 or Arduino to measure the quality of the air you breathe!  Today, we'll work with several air quality sensors.

Article with code:  https://dronebotworkshop.com/air-quality

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Pollution is a problem that affects everyone, no matter where they live. Even if you reside in a rural area, you are still subject to many types of pollution, both outdoors and inside your home.
Today we will look at several air quality sensors that you can use with a microcontroller. We’ll test them out using both an ESP323 and an Arduino, and we’ll also compare the readings to a commercial air quality meter to see if there is any correlation between readings.

We’ll be taking a look at the following sensors:

- MQ Gas Sensors (various models).

- PMS5003 PM2.5 Particulate Matter Sensor.

- BME280 Temperature, Humidity & Air Pressure Sensor.

- BME680 Temperature, Humidity & Gas Sensor.

- AHT20 Precision Temperature & Humidity Sensor.

- CCS811 Air Quality Sensor.

- SGP30 Air Quality Sensor.

- SGP40 Air Quality Sensor.

We’ll see how they work and what parameters they can measure, and we’ll hook them up and run a demo.

Then we’ll put a bunch of sensors together on an ESP32 to make an environmental monitoring platform.

Here is the Table of Contents for today's video:

00:00 - Introduction

01:38 - Air Quality

03:36 - Look at sensors

05:12 - Sensor Calibration Issues

06:46 - MQ Sensors Intro

12:25 - MQ Sensors Library & Code

16:42 - MQ Sensors ESP32 Considerations

21:00 - PM2.5 Sensors

27:55 - Temperature & Humidity Sensors Intro

31:25 - BME280 Demo

33:28 - BME680 Demo

35:49 - AHT20 Demo

37:33 - Air Quality Sensors Intro

39:40 - CCS811 Demo

43:09 - SGP30 Demo

45:38 - SGP40 Demo

47:36 - ESP32 Multi-Sensor

58:45 - Conclusion

On a personal note, this project actually alerted me to several areas in my home that I need to improve the air circulation in. Hopefully, you will find it equally useful!

Bill

 

EPA Takes Important Step to Advance PFAS Strategic Roadmap, Requests Public Input and Data to Inform Potential Future Regulations under CERCLA

WASHINGTON (April 13, 2023) — Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is issuing an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) asking the public for input regarding potential future hazardous substance designations of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), also known as “Superfund.”

“Today’s announcement highlights EPA’s commitment to transparency and the use of the best available science to tackle PFAS pollution and protect people from exposure to these forever chemicals,” said Barry N. Breen, Acting Assistant Administrator for EPA’s Office of Land and Emergency Management. “This is a key commitment under the Agency’s PFAS Strategic Roadmap and will provide an opportunity for a large and diverse group of stakeholders, including the public, state and local governments, Tribes, industry, businesses, environmental groups, and universities, to provide input and help EPA gather the latest science and information regarding PFAS.”

This request for input and information follows EPA’s September 2022 proposed rule to designate two PFAS — perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS), and their salts and structural isomers — as hazardous substances under CERCLA. EPA is currently reviewing comments received on this proposed rule.

Through this ANPRM, EPA is seeking input on whether to propose to designate additional PFAS, including HFPO-DA, sometimes called GenX, and compounds that degrade in the environment by processes such as biodegradation, photolysis, and hydrolysis, to form certain PFAS. EPA is also seeking information on whether some PFAS compounds can or should be designated as a group or category.

PFAS can accumulate and persist in the human body for long periods of time and evidence from laboratory animal and human epidemiology studies indicates that exposure to these compounds may lead to cancer, reproductive, developmental, cardiovascular, liver, and immunological effects. Many known and potential sources of PFAS contamination are near communities already overburdened with pollution.

A Federal Register Notice has been published in the Federal Register at docket EPA-HQ-OLEM-2022-0922 and can be viewed on www.regulations.gov. The ANPRM will be open for a 60-day comment period through June 12, 2023.

EPA intends to carefully review all the comments and information received in response to this ANPRM.

An agency may publish an ANPRM in the Federal Register to seek input and obtain more information. If EPA decides to move forward with designating additional PFAS compounds as hazardous substances under CERCLA, the agency will publish a proposed rule and seek public comment.

EPA is not reopening or otherwise proposing to modify any existing regulations through this ANPRM.

Under the Roadmap, EPA is working across its programs and with its federal partners across the Biden-Harris Administration to develop solutions to the PFAS crisis and protect public health.

Read the ANRPM here.
Read more about EPA’s strategy to address PFAS here. 
Read more about EPA’s Superfund program here. 

For further information: EPA Press Office (press@epa.gov)

We Went to East Palestine: What We Saw May Shock You

DO YOU TRUST GOVERNMENT?

Take A Deep Breath

AND JUST LOOK AROUND!

Please Listen.

♦️♦️♦️♦️♦️

pic.twitter.com/0JKSAPMk8L

— ♦️GALLOPING GAYE♦️ (@GallopingGaye) March 29, 2023

Hemp plants can suck PFAS, aka "forever chemicals," out of the ground

Hemp, a variety of the plant Cannabis sativa, is often overshadowed by marijuana — a genetically distinct form of cannabis. Used for food, clothing, fuel, and plastics, it’s the seemingly more domestic member of the family.

However, new research suggests we should pay more attention to this nonpsychoactive substance. Hemp, scientists say, has an eco-friendly superpower: It can rid the environment of toxic chemicals.

Members of the Micmac (Mi'kmaq) Nation — a tribe indigenous to what’s now known as Canada’s eastern Maritime Provinces and parts of the northeastern United States — the activist group Upland Grassroots, and research scientists came together in 2019 to test methods for removing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) from land located at the Loring Air Force Base. After years of lobbying and dispute, portions of the former bomber base were given back to the Aroostook Band of Micmacs in 2018.

On Tuesday, the eclectic team published a commentary reflecting on their work and progress in the journal Cell Press. The project, so far, is a success: Results suggest planting small fields of fiber hemp removed a primary type of PFAS at the polluted site, a chemical called perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS).

“Protecting the land is part of the Micmac beliefs,” Chief E. Peter Paul of the Micmac Nation said in the commentary. “Anything we can do to contribute to making the environment better, we want to be a part of.”

What you need to know first — The idea of removing toxic contaminants from the soil by planting certain plants is known as “phytoremediation.”

Hemp is “versatile in extracting many different kinds of chemicals from the soil,” Chelli Stanley, a member of Upland Grassroots, states in the commentary.

Previous research has also demonstrated industrial hemp can be effective in phytoremediation.

“Hemp phytoremediation has been previously used for other types of soil contaminants – mainly metals,” Sara L. Nason, one of the lead researchers on the project, tells Inverse. Nason is a scientist affiliated with the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment station.

Hemp plants can suck PFAS, aka "forever chemicals," out of the ground

Mead Nebraska Ongoing Environmental Disaster

Host: Cathy Wyatt Guests: #1 Eleanor Rogan, Ph.D. | College of Public Health, UNMC #2 Judy Wu-Smart, Ph.D. | Department of Entomology, UN-L #3 Janece Mollhoff | Resident, Ashland, NE An idea that normally could provide environmental benefits backfires. Since 2015, the ethanol plant was using treated corn, coated with fungicides and insecticides, including harmful bee-killing neonics, to produce its biofuel. The state finally filed a lawsuit in 2021 and ordered the plant shut down. Learn what has happened since then, how concerned those living in and around the area should be, and where we go from here.

AltEn Crisis in Mead https://t.co/t2I33T6B1H NO ON CARES #OhioChemicalDisaster

— GHOST OF CHAOS (@GHOSTOFCHAOS420) March 3, 2023

I would like to appeal to the logical area of the brain for a moment. We know we're under attack by the state. Rather than expend our energy debating the precise nature of each tool being used to murder us, I suggest we focus our attention and talk about the only peaceful way out https://t.co/2I6l0V6h3h

— Roadtoserfdom (@roadtoserfdom3) March 3, 2023

18 Products Made From Trash - Season 3 Marathon | World Wide Waste | Ins...

Microbe Bacteria DIOXIN Remediation

this was a @EPA and @DeptofDefense funded research project in Vietnam for Dioxin and Agent Orange remediation/soil reclamation. aka the EPA knows there are solutions avail to help in the #OhioChernobyl https://t.co/mMcCJWgnfg

— systembuster (@stlsystembuster) February 26, 2023

 Ohio Trainwreck Bioremediation Soil Treatment Research

JOINT STUDY OF BIOREMEDIATION AT PILOT SCALE FOR DETOXIFICATION OF HERBICIDE/DIOXIN IN DA NANG HOT SPOT, VIETNAM

Dang TCH1, Allen H2, Nguyen BH1, Fong V2, Dam TH1, Nguyen NQ1, Nguyen QH1, Phung KHC3, Dao TNA1 

Institute of Biotechnology, Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology (VAST);  

US Environment Protection Agency (EPA); Military Institute of Chemical and Environmental Research, MOD Vietnam

https://dioxin20xx.org/wp-content/uploads/pdfs/2010/10-1689.pdf

Introduction

Biodegradation of tetrachloro dibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD) has been reported in the scientific literature, in the laboratory, and in pilot studies. From 1999 to 2009, Vietnamese researchers conducted several studies to detoxify heavily contaminated soil in the former Da Nang military base1

. 

Full-scale bioremediation of 3,384 m3 of dioxin contaminated soil was demonstrated in Bien Hoa, Vietnam, in 2009. Several international scientific work groups have concluded that bioremediation is the most environmentally responsible and cost-effective remedy for cleaning up Agent Orange residues at the former air bases in Vietnam.

More than 30 years after the US-Vietnam War, spilled Agent Orange defoliant solution containing traces of the dioxins, TCDD and octachloro dibenzo-p-dioxin (OCDD), 2,4,5-T, 2,4-D, and chlorophenols (TCP and DCP) remains in the soil and in lake sediment affected by contaminated soil, which had been carried by runoff from the former military airbase in Da Nang2 . Natural attenuation of the herbicides and dioxins has not been effective in detoxifying the soil or sediment. 

This first joint study by Vietnamese and American researchers was conducted to

demonstrate whether the soil in Da Nang can be bioremediated effectively using aerobic or anaerobic microbial processes. This study also sought to provide engineering design guidance to support the selection of either an aerobic or an anaerobic amendment recipe and an operating strategy to optimize biological treatment. 

Conclusions Aerobic bioremediation is capable of significantly reducing TCDD toxicity (p=0.0026). Bioaugmentation with small amounts of treated soil or contaminated sediment may be effective for anaerobic treatment. However, if suitable growth conditions are provided, the indigenous microbes in the mixed soil and sediment at Da Nang appear capable of degrading TCDD without adding another source of microbes. Anaerobic bioremediation rate is about half the rate of aerobic treatment, but the results are not as significant (p=0.25). From our of point active landfill containing both aerobic and anaerobic degradation become feasible resolution for detoxification of heavy herbicide/dioxin in full scale in Vietnam. 

Bioremediation is recognized as a “Green Technology,” which has a very low energy requirement and produces few emissions. Bioremediation is a permanent solution which produces a soil which can be returned to beneficial use. Knowledge gained from this project by both Vietnamese and US scientists will allow for design of customized recipes suitable for addressing dioxin and other persistent organic pollution problems throughout Vietnam and elsewhere 

@EPA Own Publications explained how to deal with #Ohio Chemical Incineration > U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Dioxin Treatment Technologies Background Paper, OTA-BP-O-93 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government printing Office) pic.twitter.com/2VDdPloAYg

— systembuster (@stlsystembuster) February 26, 2023

This type of Incinerator is very similar to the #Downdraft #Gasifer Offgrid Hot Water and Hot Air system I designed and shared months ago. https://t.co/Im01RKt8uo pic.twitter.com/jGsSxS4aor

— systembuster (@stlsystembuster) February 26, 2023

#OhioChernobyl Research Files https://t.co/h1F8Khg5h6 to cleanup the #chemicals

This research paper from 1991 from the EPA CluIn Files for #Dioxin Incineration System provides a Diagram source file:
Dioxin Treatment Technologies
November 1991 OTA-BP-O-93 NTIS order PB92-152511 pic.twitter.com/VPsyW4ZqW1

— systembuster (@stlsystembuster) February 26, 2023