Month: January 2022

Canāree Air Quality Monitors deployed to measure air quality and identify sources

 

Nigeria has the largest economy in Africa and the 27’th largest economy in the world in terms of nominal GDP.[1]  Accompanying this growth is air pollution.  In 2019, the entire Nigerian population lived with PM_2.5 concentrations above the WHO air quality guideline of 5 ug/m³ [2].  With Nigeria’s mean concentration at 72 ug/m3, 15 x the WHO guideline, it has the fourth most polluted air of any country after China, India, and Pakistan.

 

Contributors to poor air quality in Nigeria include vehicle emissions, solid waste burning, and industrial emissions.  Seasonal variations in pollution exist, with the highest levels of air pollution in the dry season (Harmattan, November to March) during which agricultural burning occurs.[3]  Unlike the USA, Nigeria does not have a national network of air quality monitoring stations to monitor wildfire smoke so local authorities, citizen scientists, and researchers are leveraging a new generation of affordable air quality monitors to provide real-time updates, help shape government policy, and improve the health of citizens.

 

 

To that end, Piera Systems, developers of the industry’s most accurate, low-cost Intelligent Particulate Sensors and family of Canāree™ Air Quality Monitors is partnering with Professor Francis Abulude, PhD, CEO of the Science and Education Development Institute, Akure, Ondo State, Nigeria to deploy a network of Canāree monitors in schools, hospitals, homes, and offices starting in December 2021.  During the 6-month Harmattan season, data from the Canāree monitors will be sent to Piera’s SenseiAQ™ cloud for analysis.  SenseiAQ provides real-time data on intuitive dashboards and maps along with alerts when air quality is poor.  Analysis of the data will classify likely sources of pollution including cooking, vehicle pollution, wildfires, diesel generators, vape, and tobacco smoking. This uniquely differentiated capability of identifying sources of pollution will lead to more effective mitigation techniques designed to reduce the immediate health impact, inform citizens of hot spots, and help drive government policies and regulation.

 

 

Dr. Abulude’s team at ESRG (Environmental and Sustainable Research Group (ESRG, Nigeria) a division of Science and Education Development Institute, Nigeria will deploy and manage the Canāree monitors. The data from this project will help in our global effort to improve air quality, deal with the impacts of climate change, and improve the health of everyone. Progress of the project will be kept up to date on the ‘Canāree Sentinels’ community group on Facebook. As with miners in the UK who deployed real canaries as sentinels in coal mines, these 21st century Canāree monitors will act as sentinels to avoid unnecessary deaths and health impacts due to air pollution. More information on Canāree monitors can be found at https://www.pierasystems.com/canaree.

 

About Piera Systems, Inc.

Piera Systems Inc. is on a mission to make air quality measurement accurate, simple, inexpensive, and pervasive, enabling a major improvement in the health of all humans. Piera has developed a family of ‘Intelligent Particle Sensors’ utilizing a breakthrough custom processor to detect particulate matter (PM), a major component of air pollution. Unlike existing low-cost PM sensors, IPS has superior accuracy over a wider range, including harmful ‘very fine particles’ smaller than 1.0 micron, and reports particle size and count in real-time at low power. IPS is the first software defined PM sensor with up to 7 particle sizes allowing its use in many applications. IPS data is analyzed using AI/ML algorithms to identify and classify pollution sources such as vape, cigarette smoke, cooking, etc. IPS sensors and Canāree air quality monitors answer the question, ‘What’s In Your Air?’

Headquartered in the US, more information on Piera Systems air quality solutions can be found at https://www.pierasystems.com

 

About ESRG

The Environmental and Sustainable Research Group (ESRG) is a group committed to advancing research-based issues of the environment and sustainability. This research group was established in Nigeria in January 2016. The group focuses on the environmental problems that threaten the health of living things. The main foci of the group include:

i. Plays an important role in any form to ensure the creation of a sustainable future

ii. of indoor and outdoor aerosols with a view of reducing the impact on children and women especially.

iii. Collaborates on the issues of sustainable cities and communities

iv.And partnerships in activities involving clean water and sanitation

 

[1] Wikipedia, World Bank

[2] State of Global Air Reports for 2019 and 2020

[3] International Association for Medical Assistance to Travelers

Scottsdale, AZ – Jan 13 2022. Piera Systems (“Piera”) is proud to announce the release of calibration certificate for its Intelligent Particle Sensors (“IPS”), tested and calibrated in accordance with ISO 21501-4 standard, a requirement for particle counters used in many applications where accuracy and precision between instruments are high. Piera’s affordable Canāree Air Quality Monitors are built using this IPS technology. This is the first time a low-cost sensor has demonstrated that it is calibratable to this strict standard, which is normally used to calibrate reference grade instruments and monitors.

 

The ISO 21501-4, and its companion standard ISO 14644-1, are widely used in applications where tolerance for particle contamination is quite low including in the electronics and semiconductor industries, pharmaceutical industry, and medical environments. These standards set forth stringent tolerance levels for performance of particle counters across many criteria including accuracy of particle counts and precision across measurements from multiple instruments as well as calibration procedures and verification methods.

 

“Being able to calibrate our sensors to ISO 21501-4 is a testament to our ‘correct by construction’ technology stack including our revolutionary ASIC, calibration algorithms and methodologies, and our highly scalable test and QA processes,” said Aaron Soh, Founder and CTO of Piera Systems. “We are immensely proud of our R&D team’s ability to deliver superior air quality data that’s comparable to a reference instrument at a fraction of the price.”

 

This unprecedented ability to accurately count particles at an affordable price-point unlocks brand new applications in a number of industries as this performance has thus far only been possible with reference grade instruments and monitors which can cost 10s of thousands of dollars making them unscalable. Environments that are highly sensitive to particle pollution, such as a pharmaceutical cleanroom or a hospital surgical room, can now deploy a vast array of Piera’s sensors and monitors to accurately monitor air quality in real time and ensure a high standard of operating environments.

 

 

 

“As a provider of air quality monitoring solutions to pharmaceutical and healthcare facilities, we adhere to stringent performance standards and expect the same from our technology and product partners,” said Séverine MORIAU, Head of R&D at Zaack. “Specialized air quality monitoring solutions, like our Zaack CR® cleanroom air quality monitor, require extreme attention to detail and are heavily regulated. We collaborated closely with Piera to certify their sensors to ISO 21501-4 which coupled with their highly affordable price-point makes them an ideal partner for Zaack’s products and services.”

 

For more information on the ISO standards referenced in this document, please refer to this article. Please contact Piera Systems to obtain a copy of the ISO certificate and accompanying test results.

 

About Piera Systems, Inc.

Piera Systems Inc. is on a mission to make air quality measurement accurate, simple, inexpensive, and pervasive, enabling a major improvement in the health of all humans. Piera has developed a family of ‘Intelligent Particle Sensors’ utilizing a breakthrough custom processor to detect particulate matter (PM), a major component of air pollution. Unlike existing low-cost PM sensors, IPS has superior accuracy over a wider range, including harmful ‘very fine particles’ smaller than 1.0 micron, and reports particle size and count in real-time at low power. IPS is the first software defined PM sensor with up to 7 particle sizes allowing its use in many applications. IPS data is analyzed using AI/ML algorithms to identify and classify pollution sources such as vape, cigarette smoke, cooking, etc. IPS sensors and Canāree air quality monitors answer the question, ‘What’s In Your Air?’

Headquartered in the US, more information on Piera Systems air quality solutions can be found at https://www.pierasystems.com

 

About Zaack

ZAACK is the research and development subsidiary of IGIENAIR Group. It was founded in 2017 and it offers innovative connected technologies for indoor air quality monitoring. ZAACK started by developing a full range of indoor air quality monitoring systems for commercial and residential spaces and is currently developing a range for special applications such as cleanrooms and healthcare facilities.

Zaack CR^® is the only compact plug & play cleanroom monitoring station that can monitor in real time, particles (pcs/m³), temperature, relative humidity and differential pressure. It gives the operators real-time access to critical data over the cloud. Data is automatically logged and saved on the cloud or on the client’s server. Users have the choice to work with raw data or to view in graphical smart phone and web applications.

For more information on our products & air quality services, visit: zaack.io & igienair.com

 

Contact Information

Raj Seelam

Vice President of Marketing & Customer Success

raj.seelam@pierasystems.com

 

Séverine MORIAU

Head of Research and Development

contact@zaack.io

Introduction

Optical particle sensors are being widely deployed in outdoor and indoor applications to monitor air quality and control air cleaning technologies.  Low-cost sensors are not designed to replace expensive reference instruments but are being widely adopted in a range of applications with 57M units shipped last year.  There are many studies discussing the limitations of these devices especially for indoor sources[1]. The EPA cautions that their data are ‘estimates’ and not a substitute for expensive reference devices.  They all use similar low-cost electronics.  Seeing a better way, Piera leveraged advances in semiconductors, Machine Learning/AI and an increasing understanding of the health threat created by sub-micron particles to create a new generation of Intelligent Particle Sensors (IPS) with more accurate, complete data on particle size and count which can identify likely sources of pollution.  This data driven approach in a real-time monitor provides insight and enables actions to be taken to reduce or remove particle sources and improve air quality.  Achieving this in a low-cost device required a ‘correct by construction’ technology stack including a revolutionary ASIC, calibration algorithms and methodologies, and highly scalable test and QA processes.  Piera’s devices are calibrated based on particle count and size, unlike all other low-cost sensor manufacturers that utilize Mass Concentration (MC or PM).  This enables IPS to meet the ISO 21501-4 standard for calibration of optical sensors.  ISO 21501-4 compliance is a requirement for monitoring clean rooms under ISO 14244-1.  Piera’s IPS is the first low-cost sensor to achieve this certification.

 

The ISO 21501-4 Standard

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO), introduced ISO 21501 in 2007… “to provide a calibration procedure and verification method for particle counters, so as to minimize the inaccuracy in the measurement result by a counter, as well as the difference in the results measured by different instruments.”  The 2015 publication includes 4 different sections with each dedicated to a specific particle counting technology/application.  Part 4 (-4): Light Scattering Airborne Particle Counter for Clean Spaces applies to Light Scattering Aerosol Particle Counters (LSAPC). Piera’s IPS is an LSAPC.  The ISO14644-1 standard for clean rooms requires monitoring with instruments calibrated to ISO 21501-4.  Certification to ISO 21501-4 can be done by any company following strict testing requirements.  Piera has utilized a third-party testing lab, The Korea Electronics Technology Institute (KETI) for its certification.

Following the testing protocol specified in ISO 21501-4, KETI tested 4 IPS sensors from a standard production run utilizing a controlled chamber and PSL particles of sizes 0.3, 0.5, 1.0 microns traceable to NIST.  A flow meter monitored air flow and a reference instrument (Grimm 11-D) calibrated to ISO 21501-4 was compared to the ISP sensors.  During the test period, Counting Efficiency and Flow rate were measured for each of the 3 particle sizes.   Key metrics reported include Average of Fine dust (#/m²), False count rate (#/m²), counting efficiency (%), uncertainty (%), Flow rate (L/min).  ISO 21501-4 mandates counting efficiency within 10% of the reference device which was met for all devices at all sizes.  Copies of the certification document and test report are available upon request.

Applications that benefit from ISO 21501-4 certified sensors and instruments include hospitals, healthcare facilities, electronic and semiconductor manufacturing facilities, pharmaceutical and other industrial workplaces.   Piera’s Canāree Air Quality Monitors are the first affordable devices that have a ‘clean room’ quality sensor.

 

Certifications and Standards for measuring air quality

The Clean Air Act requires the EPA to set National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for pollutants that are common in outdoor air.  The WHO has similar standards but at a much lower level and in Sept 2021, WHO reduced the daily value for PM 2.5 in half to 5.0ug (the US is still at 12.5 ug but this is under review).  PM is short for Mass Concentration (MC or PM) the weight of all the particles (ug or micrograms) 2.5 microns and below.  MC is not used to measure air quality when it’s made up of smaller particles.  Instead, particle count and size are needed as in ISO 21501-4.  The current generation of low-cost sensors are calibrated to MC since that is what the EPA mandates and are not able to reliably measure below 10 ug, especially in environments where submicron particles are dominant (indoors).

There are no equivalent standards for Indoor Air Quality.  Since ISO 14244-1 is already used indoors and measures particles of sizes 0.1, 0.3, 0.5 and 1.0 microns it should be considered.  In fact, Class 9 is considered ‘Normal’ or good air, see Table 1.

 

 

Instead, several third party indoor ‘standards and certifications’ have emerged based on MC.  These include ASHRAE Standard 62.1, ASTM-D8405-21, MCERTS (UK).  In the built environment RESET, WELL, LEEDS have developed their own audit and compliance standards.

Regardless of what standard is used a common requirement is the need to have a methodology for calibration. ISO 21501-4 is the recognized standard for optical particle counter calibration.

 

Summary

Piera’s custom PSC-1 processor with 3 US patents is the foundation of our IPS Sensor and Canāree AQMs.  Representing years of development and leveraging advanced semiconductor processes it delivers accurate and precise data on particle size and count across a wide range of particle sizes for all our devices.  It’s the basis of our ‘correct by construction’ technology stack and investments in calibration and testing ensuring every device meets specifications and allows customers to use them with confidence.

You might not need your home, office, or public space to be a class 6 ‘clean room’, but you do want the air to be good enough not to affect your health.  This requires the type of data delivered by Piera.

 

 

[1] Response of consumer and research grade indoor air quality monitors to residential sources of fine particles, Singer, Delp  https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29683219/