Dubai to add mobile air quality monitoring vehicle

Dubai Municipality has purchase an environmentally friendly mobile air quality monitoring vehicle that will be delivered by the end of March from Germany, where the final commissioning of the unit is currently under way.

The station, a first of its kind in the region, includes 20 devices to monitor for around 100 compounds associated with common pollutants that pollute the air.

“The stations will serve as a mobile environmental operations room. It can respond to emergencies situations and crises through communication channels linked directly to Municipality,” said Eng Hussain Nasser Lootah, director general of Dubai Municipality.

“The employees of the station will be able to provide the levels and concentrations of pollutants in real time, which can support the decision-making processes and allow taking appropriate measures and actions faster to protect the public from pollution.

The environmentally-friendly vehicle is powered by a Euro 5 emissions standards engine and has been equipped with solar panels for the operation of all of the technical devices.

More than just green credentials, these features will critically ensure that the vehicle’s power generation does not impact its own readings.

A working group from the Municipality is also due to travel to Germany for an intensive training course on the operation and maintenance of the station, and the calibration of its internationally accredited monitoring equipment.

In all, the manufacture and delivery of the mobile station took about eight months, including two months for the design and specification of the monitoring equipment.

One testing device, a 100m coil of spiralled pipes equipped with numerous sensors is able to process air samples for 75 base components of pollutants including nitrogen oxides and hydrogen chloride.

“We had to select equipment and software appropriate to the climatic nature of the country, and ensure that they meet the needs and requirements of the growth in Dubai,” said Lootah.

The station will also be able to conduct precise environmental surveys across the emirate with a suite of specialised hardware for monitoring suspended particles, according to Eng Alya Al Harmoudi, director of environmental department at the Municipality.

Al Harmoudi added that the station can monitor for radioactive particles, noise pollution and weather conditions including wind speed, temperature, humidity, solar radiation and rainfall.

All of the captured data will be immediately uploaded onto digital map for the ready identification of the sites that exceed the limits of environmental air pollutants.