Energy Harvesting-enabled 5G Advanced Air Pollution Monitoring Device

We have designed a 5G-capable environmental sensing network (ESN) node prototype, called Advanced Air Pollution Monitoring Device (AAPMD). The developed prototype system measures concentrations of NO
2
, Ozone, carbon monoxide, and sulphur dioxide using semiconductor sensors. Further, the system gathers other environmental parameters like temperature, humidity, PM
1
, PM
2
.
5
, and PM
10
. The prototype is equipped with a GPS sub-system for accurate geo-tagging. The board communicates through Wi-Fi and NB-IoT. AAPMD is also implemented with energy harvesting power management, and is powered through solar energy and battery backup. Compared to the conventional designs with Wi-Fi-based connectivity, the developed system consumes 10-times less energy while using 5G NB-IoT communication module, which makes it a very competitive candidate for massive deployment in highly polluted metro cities like Delhi and Kolkata, in India. The system can provide updated measurements of pollutant levels with controllable time granularity.