Atmospheric measurements: do it yourself, do it together!

摘要

As sensor and communication technology is developing rapidly, the use of low-cost sensors to measure air quality is becoming more and more attractive to citizen communities and city governments. Alternative monitoring networks complementing official monitoring networks are within reach. Not only offers this the exciting possibility of more data and more detailed spatial resolution in monitoring, it also offers new possibilities to inform the public, create awareness about atmospheric hazards, and to empower citizens by enabling them to do their own measurements. The Dutch Environmental Protection Agency, RIVM has the ambition to support these activities. Theoretically, we would have a role in assuring data quality, providing calibration facilities, knowledge and a (political) context for interpreting the results. But what do citizens or cities need from us in practice? In order to explore this question, we joined several projects such as the Amsterdam Smart Citizen Lab (see Figure, https://waag.org/enews/amsterdam-smart-citizens-lab-publication) and the project Smart Emission in Nijmegen (http://www.ru.nl/gpm/onderzoek/research-projects/smart-emission). We learned that taking citizen science seriously is a self-fulfilling prophecy. By joining a citizen project governmental institutes raise trust and enthusiasm in the participants, and the chance of success is increased. We experienced that citizens are quite prepared to take responsibility, but expertise and help from the government is often appreciated. We conclude that citizen science is something to do together: citizens, sensor makers, experts from universities, and environmental protection agencies. We will present what we learned about our role in citizen science as an environmental protection agency and what we plan to contribute to the goal of citizen science becoming an integral part of a healthy society.