By Juan Pedro Tomás
Ericsson, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur (IIT Kanpur) and Bharti Airtel have collaborated with the Rajasthan Pollution Control Board (RSPCB) to deploy NB-IoT sensors in the city of Jaipur with the aim of monitoring air pollution in real time, Ericsson said in a release.
The low-cost, NB-IoT-based air quality sensors have been installed at 40 key locations in Jaipur. The real-time data collected by the sensors is analyzed by RSPCB and displayed to the public at five identified locations in the city. These displayed data will include PM2.5, PM10, and air quality index (AQI) concentrations.
In addition to increased public awareness, this will support policy intervention, and enable corrective actions to be taken to reduce air pollution, the Swedish vendor said.
As part of the collaboration, IIT Kanpur is also launching a mobile app for easy access to the air quality data, which will raise public awareness about air pollution levels among Jaipur residents.
Chairperson of the Rajasthan State Pollution Control Board, Veenu Gupta said: “I’m very happy to launch this project and appreciate the efforts made by IIT Kanpur, Ericsson and Airtel in developing and supporting this low cost sensor network project in Jaipur. It will help in better understanding of the air quality of Jaipur and formulating a scientific action plan for control of air pollution in city”.
Sachchida Nand Tripathi, of the department of civil engineering at IIT Kanpur, said: “The collaboration with Ericsson mainly by implementing NB IoT has helped sensors data transmissibility, reduced power consumption and increased battery life. This has resulted in more autonomous sensor network.”
Meanwhile, head of marketing and communications, SCR and GIR, Ericsson South east Asia, Oceania and India, Sonia Aplin added: “Having successfully deployed our NB-IoT sensor based solution for measuring air quality in Delhi, we are happy to scale and deploy this solution in Jaipur city. This project will enable Jaipur city to better manage the pollution levels by creating awareness amongst residents and authorities, leading to better air pollution management.”
The partnership will also include working with community-based organizations to raise awareness regarding air pollution and steps that can be taken to reduce it.
In July 2019, IIT Kanpur and Ericsson had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to deploy a NB-IoT based sensor network to monitor air pollution in Delhi.
As part of the MoU, Ericsson implemented locally developed air quality sensors that are capable of sharing environmental data including PM1, PM2.5 and PM10 levels at defined time intervals.
