AirGradient Forum

Can the AirGradient Outdoor detect the presence of wood-combustion smoke?

#1

Hi everyone,

I am searching for a means of detecting wood-combustion smoke outside my house (smoke coming from neighbors occasionally using wood stoves for heating). Smoke tends to stagnate, and gets sucked in by my house’s mechanized ventilation. I’d like to automatically throttle my ventilation when there’s smoke.

Would an AirGradient Outdoor be able to detect the presence of smoke? I don’t think that PM2.5 can be a reliable vector, because there is significant PM2.5 coming from non-wood sources. Would VOC (or particles of other sizes) help detecting smoke?

I have an AirGradient One that I installed in my bedroom. So far, I have not been able to identify a significant correlation between the VOC (or PM) data of the sensor and the presence of a smoke smell inside the house, unfortunately. The smell is a lot weaker inside the house than outside, of course.

Many thanks!

#2

PM2.5 and VOC in an outdoor sensor will correlate with exhaust from combustion, but it won’t tell you what the source of that is. If you live in an area with an otherwise already poor air quality, neighbour’s emissions might not even provide enough signal for you to take action.

Regardless, I would recommend relying not on detection, but rather continuous management of the possible issues. That means having a high quality filtering (HEPA at minimum) stage in your system and maintaining it periodically. Explore adding activated carbon (or buy appropriate filters that integrate both) to deal with non-particulate problems such as smell. That way you won’t have to live at your neighbour’s externalities’ mercy :slight_smile: