Google and Aclima have collected 100 million air pollution and greenhouse gas measurements

Google’s Project Air View, launched in 2015 by Google and Aclima, has reached a new milestone of more than 100 million air pollution and greenhouse gas measurements collected globally since the research phase began.

The companies made the announcement ahead of the European Union’s Green Week, and Google and Aclima are kicking off the launch of Air View in the City of Dublin, Ireland. Aclima air pollution and greenhouse gas measurement and analysis technology integrated with Google’s first all-electric Street View car — a Jaguar I-PACE — will produce hyperlocal air quality insights for the Dublin City Council as part of its Smart Dublin program.

Aclima is Google Street View’s global partner for sensing air quality with Street View vehicles, which can deliver a block-by-block view of air pollution. Aclima provides the sensor instrumentation, data and analytics infrastructure, and scientific expertise to support high quality delivery and interpretation from the mobile platform.

Aclima recently raised $40 million and said it is a Public Benefit Corporation, meaning its charter is to serve the public rather than maximize profits for shareholders.

Above: An Aclima Mobile Node senses air pollution in Dublin, Ireland in the first all-electric Google Street View vehicle.

Image Credit: Aclima

Aclima’s mobile air monitoring platform measures and analyzes nitrogen dioxide (NO2), nitric oxide (NO), carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO), fine particulate matter (PM2.5), and ozone (O3) along with geospatial and meteorological data within dozens of Street View vehicles as they traverse cities around the world.

Google makes this data available to researchers and city officials through Environmental Insights Explorer (EIE), a free tool that provides thousands of cities with actionable data and insights to reduce their emissions.

Building on more than three years of research collaboration with Aclima mobile laboratories, in 2018 Google announced their plans to expand air quality mapping with Aclima in Street View cars around the globe.

In 2020, Aclima and Google made a massive air pollution dataset freely available to the scientific community. Over the course of four years, the two companies had together generated and aggregated more than 42 million hyperlocal air quality measurements throughout California. This dataset has helped researchers to advance our understanding of hyperlocal air pollution and its impacts on human health, with peer-reviewed research publications including Environmental Science & Technology and Environmental Health Journal.

Recent studies have advanced scientific knowledge of the way air pollution varies over space and time, and how disproportionate potential exposures correlate with disproportionate health impacts.

As an example, in June 2020, two studies compared mobile and stationary air quality monitoring and mapping in Atmospheric Measurement Techniques and Environmental Science and Technology using Aclima and Google research data from Los Angeles, San Francisco, the northern San Joaquin Valley, and West Oakland, California.

If you’re a scientist interested in accessing Google and Aclima research data, you can apply here.

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