The Balcarras Eco club have installed two pollution monitors to record the air quality around the school. This is an initiative created by the Cheltenham Air Quality Education Projects. A number of schools are taking part in this project to look at air quality of our local area. To see the live feed click here.

The coordinator is Hannah Leatherland from Cheltenham Borough Council. She came into school and helped the Eco club build two outdoor air monitors. These use Rasperry Pi processors to take air quality readings for Particulate matter (PM1, PM 2.5, PM4, PM10), which comes from the burning of fossil fuels. In Cheltenham this is predominantly from car exhausts and wood burning stoves. The sensors also record NOx gases, which come from Car exhausts. Along with VOC's which can contribute to Photochemical Smog.

This gives a live feed to the air quality, so far we have seen a spike in lower air quality during rush hour, in particular VOC's and Particulate matter.  The air quality has been worse with colder mornings holding the pollution in the bowl that Cheltenham sits in.

If you would like to know any more about this project come along to the Eco club on a Tuesday lunchtime in 7A6. Or you can click on the live feed here

Mr Pearce

Eco Club coordinator