The Importance of Emissions Monitoring

13 January 2020

We can’t see what we are breathing in when we stand waiting patiently for our morning train or at night when we are rushing on the underground. When we are travelling in cars or taxi’s stuck in heavy traffic or simply cycling or walking down the street filled with speed bumps. But it’s not just London (or other cities) where air pollution is a concern; its in our buildings too. The air quality in these areas impact not only the environment but our own health.

The importance of emissions monitoring for air quality and energy waste at transport hubs, particularly rail and road networks, as well as in offices and accommodation is important now more than ever, especially in light of the UKs drive for NetZero by 2050. It is also timely to turn attention to emissions because the changes in seasonal temperature can impact the carbon monoxide levels in transport hubs and our buildings.

The Institution of Mechanical Engineers published a report that concluded that emissions monitoring data could be used to set ‘informed targets’ to reduce air pollution. The report also noted that “greater monitoring of air pollutants at key transport locations including railway and underground stations, ports and airports, is needed to draw up a ‘complete picture’ of the UK’s air pollution sources”.

At CODA we are working with a variety of businesses from office and retail to manufacturing, student accommodation and the railway sector to offer emissions monitoring via our building IoT (BIoT) solution. Our cloud-based CODA software system, provides accurate emissions data, analyses and quantifies against set points, providing building owners and occupiers with accurate and real-time insights on emissions levels and instantly issues alerts/warnings should emissions levels breach desired limits that can be hazardous to health.

The software aggregates the emissions data and presents it to building owners and occupiers in a manner that they can quickly understand and identify any changes or issues immediately through dashboard displays. This offers real-time, remote building health diagnostics across their entire estate, at a glance businesses and building occupiers can see which buildings/sites have breached emissions levels providing true health and safety monitoring and validating the air quality within the buildings. Furthermore, they don’t have to stare at their analytics all day to find inefficiencies or dangerous levels, with pre-set threshold levels they will automatically be sent text and/or email alerts as events happen.

Sensors from our CODA system can monitor the internal environment across the entire estate of buildings. They have the ability to:

• Ensure emissions are monitored for health and wellbeing.
• Trigger alerts when undesirable levels are reached and at a threshold when levels are hazardous to health.
• Monitor carbon monoxide levels continuously and alert on deviations to the desired levels.
• Ensure that health and safety is a consideration 24/7.
• Alerting for rectification immediately, also ensures that there is no concern for buildings occupiers as a result of levels being hazardous to health.

Emissions monitoring is a key consideration for building owners and occupiers. Whether you are an office, a transport hub/bus depot, a railway station or landlord for student accommodation, the importance of real-time emissions monitoring is becoming even more important. Especially in light of the recently reported ‘London throat’ threat. Yet this is not just in London; emissions and air pollution is both inside and outside your building and home. Solutions like our CODA device and emissions monitoring sensors can help ensure your building and the building occupiers are kept safe and well with pollution levels being kept to an absolute minimum.