NB-AirStream: Advancing Air Quality Monitoring with LoRa and NB-IoT Integration

Growing concerns about air pollution highlight the need for efficient solutions in air quality monitoring. This study presents a novel air quality assessment system integrating Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) with Narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT), Long Range (LoRa) communication, and Message Queuing Telemetry Transport (MQTT) technologies. The system adopts a star topology with primary and secondary nodes, utilizing LoRa for primary-secondary communication and NB-IoT for cloud connectivity. Data are processed on the IoT analytics cloud platform ThingsBoard. Deployed on a campus, the system accurately measured varying concentrations and Air Quality Index (AQI) readings. Switching from a frequency of 125kHz to 500kHz improves latency across various scenarios. Investigated improvements include 5.13% with Spreading Factor 7 (SF7) and 4.44% with SF12 at 0 meters, as well as 5.77% with SF7 and 8.33% with SF12 at 80 meters. These findings guide the optimization of air quality monitoring systems for efficient remote monitoring.