Environmental Quality bOX (EQ-OX): A Portable Device Embedding Low-Cost Sensors Tailored for Comprehensive Indoor Environmental Quality Monitoring

• Published in: Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) Vol. 24; no. 7; p. 2176
• Main Authors: Corona, Jacopo, Tondini, Stefano, Gallichi Nottiani, Duccio, Scilla, Riccardo, Gambaro, Andrea, Pasut, Wilmer, Babich, Francesco, Lollini, Roberto
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 01-04-2024
• Subjects: Accuracy; Acoustics; Air pollution; Building construction; Calibration; calibration methods; Commercial real estate; Data transmission; Economic aspects; Energy consumption; Environmental quality; Humidity; IEQ field measurements; Indoor air quality; indoor environmental quality monitoring; IoT sensing; Laboratory equipment; low-cost sensors; Open source software; Outdoor air quality; Pandemics; Pollutants; Sensors; Temperature; United Kingdom; Australia; calibration methods; indoor environmental quality monitoring; IoT sensing; IEQ field measurements; low-cost sensors
• ISSN: 1424-8220; 1424-8220
• DOI: 10.3390/s24072176

The continuous monitoring of indoor environmental quality (IEQ) plays a crucial role in improving our understanding of the prominent parameters affecting building users' health and perception of their environment. In field studies, indoor environment monitoring often does not go beyond the assessment of air temperature, relative humidity, and CO
concentration, lacking consideration of other important parameters due to budget constraints and the complexity of multi-dimensional signal analyses. In this paper, we introduce the Environmental Quality bOX (EQ-OX) system, which was designed for the simultaneous monitoring of quantities of some of the main IEQs with a low level of uncertainty and an affordable cost. Up to 15 parameters can be acquired at a time. The system embeds only low-cost sensors (LCSs) within a compact case, enabling vast-scale monitoring campaigns in residential and office buildings. The results of our laboratory and field tests show that most of the selected LCSs can match the accuracy required for indoor campaigns. A lightweight data processing algorithm has been used for the benchmark. Our intent is to estimate the correlation achievable between the detected quantities and reference measurements when a linear correction is applied. Such an approach allows for a preliminary assessment of which LCSs are the most suitable for a cost-effective IEQ monitoring system.