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As the disasters in Fukushima (pictured to a higher place) and more recently, Flint, Michigan, remind the states, the cities nosotros live in are increasingly fragile and field of study to catastrophes of both the natural and human-fabricated diverseness. While much ink has been spilled over the latest generation of smart homes, a similar and then-chosen smart trend is taking place in cities — arming communities with connected sensors to baby-sit confronting a new brood of dangers. Albert Einstein once remarked, "We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking nosotros used when nosotros created them." Indeed, the smart cities motion represents the kind of innovative thinking that's needed to combat the new ecology hazards facing metropolitan communities.

Just as many eyes turn towards Washington politics and the presidential campaigns, fiddling mention is being made of the smart cities movement and how governmental organizations can further it. In fact, the water crisis in Flint might serve as a case study for the kind of boneheaded responses municipalities have hitherto employed when facing citywide disasters — that is, wait until calamity strikes, and so throw i's hands in the air and pray for emergency federal intervention. Benjamin Franklin'south quip that an "ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" essentially sums up the divergence between this and the smart city approach. The smart cities move aims to gird cities with continued sensors that can alert communities about a disaster in time to avert or modify its form.

The unsafe lead levels that contaminated the water supply in Flint might have been detected immediately through the use of strategically positioned sensors throughout the water filigree, rather than years afterwards the fact, when many of the metropolis's residents had already suffered irreversible bodily damage. In the end, the greatest tragedy of Flint may not be that so many civilians were poisoned, but that so little seems to accept been learned from the disaster. The slowness to arm cities with connected sensors to avert these disasters suggests this is not the last time we volition read about a Flint, Michigan in the news.

Thankfully, the smart cities movement does not rest entirely in the hands of government entities, and citizens can play an important role in crowd sourcing their own smart communities. In that spirit, let'southward take a survey of some of the connected sensors that are becoming bachelor at both a consumer and commercial level to see how individuals can begin jump-starting their own smart cities.

water sensor

The Libelium WaspMote with water sensing attachments

Water

Water is without a doubt one of the nearly important natural resource on the planet. The streams, lakes, and rivers that supply our cities are increasingly jeopardized past a wide range of contaminants. We mentioned atomic number 82 with regards to the Flint tragedy, but arsenic, copper sulfate, and a wide range of bacterium can also leach into our drinking supply and imperil residential communities.

One of the companies that has been pioneering the field of connected water sensors is Libelium. Its Waspmote Smart Water platform is an ultra-low-power sensor node designed for use in rugged environments and deployment across smart cities. It is capable of measuring the pH, nitrates, dissolved oxygen, as well as atomic number 82 and copper sulfate levels. Some of the applications for which it is indicated include beverage water monitoring, detecting chemic leakage in rivers, and remote monitoring of swimming pools, spas, and hot tubs.

Some other sensor likely to find itself playing a starring part in the smart cities movement is the Carnegie Mellon Flamingo. Non much bigger than a small tote purse, the device monitors water quality and uploads the data via a network module and then that everyone who lives in the surrounding expanse can access the results. The device collects data at an ultra high frequency, co-ordinate to the company, enabling it to detect contamination events that might otherwise go unrecorded. It tin be purchased online for $529, well within the reach of most home owners associations and municipal budgets.

Air

air sensor

The Libelium Air Particulate Monitor

Another resource increasingly at risk from contaminants is the air nosotros breathe. This is especially true in big urban communities. The video footage of Chinese cities bathed in smog leaves lilliputian doubt about the telescopic of the problem. Even so, air pollution tin can be present fifty-fifty in cities without telltale signs of smog. Many factories time their worst emissions to occur at night, when the populace won't discover the behemothic plumes of smoke accruing on the horizon. Even more and so than h2o, therefore, having a widely distributed network of sensors is essential to combating the problem.

Libelium, the company behind Waspmote, also offers the Plug & Sense! Smart Environment PRO, equipped with a grit sensor capable of measuring air particulates down to 1 micrometer in diameter. This makes it much more responsive than the typical indoor air quality monitors, which only get downward to 2.5 micrometers sensitivity. Capable of existence run entirely on solar energy, the Plug & Sense! unit of measurement can exist fastened to telephone poles or electricity lines and runs near maintenance free, connecting wirelessly to the internet for data uploads.

Some other approach to the issue involves equipping people with individual, portable air monitors, which when analyzed in concert, tin can provide a detailed picture show of a city'southward air quality. A company called Aeroqual has launched a portable air quality monitor capable of detecting a broad range of pollutants, including hazardous gases and fine dust particulates.

portable air monitor

Aeroqual portable air monitor

Radiation

As if there wasn't enough to fearfulness in the modernistic urban environment, the specter of "dirty" bombs and nuclear contagion has grown enormously in the last decade. Invisible to the naked eye, radiation requires specialized sensors to detect its presence. The storied Geiger counter, once a bulky and expensive slice of laboratory equipment is at present available to anyone wishing to know the radiation levels in their metropolis.

Near impressively, this tin be done with the average phone. Joshua Cogliati and other researchers at Idaho National laboratories have devised a smartphone app that uses the camera on the phone to detect gamma rays. This could be the ultimate solution to crowd sourcing the detection of radiation within a city. Merely the way apps like Waze tin can be used to do detect traffic in existent fourth dimension, and then might we use our smartphones to discover radiation events beyond an urban population. This too carries an important lesson nigh the smart cities movement itself, which will ultimately depend equally much on a smart and responsive denizens as it volition on the devices and sensors in their neighborhoods.

Nosotros're roofing the birth of smart cities all this week; read the rest of our Smart Cities Week stories for more than. And be sure to check out our ExtremeTech Explains series for more in-depth coverage of today's hottest tech topics.