Description
ABSTRACT
This paper presents the design and construction of gas monitoring system. Gas leakage is a major concern at homes, offices, industries etc. Many homes and industries had fallen victims of inferno due to unknown Gas leakage at a hidden point. This is dangerous and requires high security to avoid life and property being destroyed. One of the preventive measures to avoid the danger associated with gas leakage is to install a gas leakage detector at vulnerable locations, hence SMS-based is proposed. The system is designed to prevent loss/death to occur through gas leakages and hence promote safety of life and property. The system consists of hardware and software; all were designed, built, programmed, and integrated. The program codes written using Embedded C-language and system test carried out to ensure optimum performance. The time it takes the user to receive an SMS from the system control unit when Gas leakage is detected is also checked and tested for accuracy to ensure prompt delivery of the early warning message of the system.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION TO THE GAS MONITORING SYSTEM
In our daily life, the environment and its condition is very important for our health as it will impact the quality of life for all of earth’s inhabitants. Consequently, the issues from environment and the air quality in industrial area are discussed to increase the alertness and responsibility regarding the environment towards public and workers’ health. The dangerous gases such as CH4, and CO will bring harmful effect towards human as they may cause explosions and CO poisoning accident in most industrial areas(Xia et al., 2012).
Thus, a gas detector is invented to ease human on detecting the presence of those dangerous gases within an area to prevent disaster happen. Nowadays, the gas detector has been innovated into various ways of detection, for example infrared thermal imaging gas leak detection, gas leakage detection with monitoring system, and wireless gas sensor network (Xia et al., 2012).
- BACKGROUND AND CONTEXT OF THE PROJECT
Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) is first produced in 1910 by Dr. Walter Snelling as a mixture of commercial propane and commercial butane having saturated as well as unsaturated hydrocarbons which is highly flammable chemical. It is an odourless gas to which Ethane oil is added as powerful odourantso that leakage can be easily detected (Xia et al., 2012). Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) is flammable mixtures of hydrocarbon gases used as fuel in homes/Industries filled in cylindrical vessels of various capacities for heating appliances, cooking equipment, and vehicles. Because of the versatile nature of LPG, it is used for many needs such as domestic fuel, industrial fuel, automobile fuel, heating, illumination etc. and the demand for LPG is on an increase day by day. The liquefied petroleum gas is finding wide us again our homes, industries and in automobiles as fuel because of its desirable properties which include high calorific value, produces less soot, produces very less smoke and does not cause much harm to the environment.
LPG burns to produce clean energy; however there is a serious threat about their leakages. The gases being heavier than air do not disperse easily and may lead to suffocation when inhaled; also the leaked gases when ignited may lead to explosion. LPG has become a widespread energy source because it’s highly combustible, which means that it can produce large amounts of heat when small amount is burnt [2]. Consequently, a natural gas leaks can increase the risk of fire and explosion since it spreads quickly and combusts easily. An electrical spark or fire source can set this off if you have a leak in your house. The number of deaths due to the explosion of gas cylinders has been increasing in recentyears.
Before the development of electronic household gas detectors in the 1980s and 1990s, gas presence was detected with a chemically infused paper that changed its color when exposed. Since then, many technologies and devices have been developed to detect, monitor, and alert the leakage of a wide array of gases (Meenakshi et al., 2014). Today, sensors have a high sensitivity to a wide gases variety; they are very compact in sizes and have significantly reduced their power consumption to adapt better portable solutions (Al-li, 2014). Building a system with a gas sensor is not as easy as it could appear. As an example the internal elements of a sensor such as heater and gas sensitive resistors have to be constantly kept under control to avoid failures leading to a wrong alarm indication. The detector can be used to trigger alarms if a specified concentration of the gas or vapour is exceeded. This can provide an early warning of a problem and help to ensure people’s safety. However, a detector does not prevent leaks occurring or indicate what action should betaken(Al-li, 2014).
LPG and Gas sensors are employed in a wide range of applications in the fields of safety, health, and instrumentation. Common examples are domestic or commercial alarms for explosive and toxic gases or in automotive application as gas leakage detectors for LPG powered cars and exhausts detectors inside any fuel powered truck or car. Such sensors, nowadays, are found also in applications involving air quality control systems and pollution monitoring[4].
Some people have low sense of smell, may or may not respond on low concentration of gas leakage. In such a case, gas leakage security systems become an essential and help to protect them from gas leakage accidents. But with this device little volume of gas leakage can be detected (Mohamad, 2019).
STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
Gas leakage in home and industrial area causes many health issues and accident. Thus, to prevent such disasters happen, the atmosphere of a workplace should be regularly monitored and controlled, in order to maintain the clean air environment.
However, efforts in industrial air quality control have been impeded by the lack of science-based approaches to identify and assess atmosphere air quality and level of dangerous gas.
Therefore, a monitoring system for gas leakage detection needs to be developed. For the development of this system, the combustible gas sensor (MQ9) was used in order to detect the present of methane (CH4) and carbon monoxide gas (CO).
OBJECTIVES OF THE PROJECT
The aim of this study is to build a monitoring device that detects gas leakage.
The objectives are:
- To build a prototype model of the system
- To supply a completely unique means for safely detecting anymalfunctionofapressurizedfacilitysoastostopaccumulationofcombustiblegasesinorderthatdamageorexplosiontanksto
- To increase home security
SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS
The scope of this work covers building an arduino Based hazardous gas leakage detection system which catalogues and categorizes the content of the feedback as positive and negative and consequently indicates whether gas leakage is there or not in the gas stored environment. It can extensively be used to detect fire breakouts in buildings, hotels, hospitals and industries or other public places. MQ-6 Gas sensors are generally used to detect or measure presence of gases like LPG and butane. The proposed system will continuously monitor the environment for any leakage. This device requires steady power supply for effect operation. That means that it will become inactive if the mains power supply fails or the battery goes low.
- The Sensor requires quarterly calibration and do not have a long life.
- For the email alert, the user must have internet facility
SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
This device detects combustible, flammable and toxic gases, and oxygen depletion. This type of device is used widely in industry and can be found in locations, such as on oil rigs, to monitor manufacture processes and emerging technologies such as photovoltaic. They may be used in firefighting.
- Provides benefit to monitor the condition of a room or environment in a safe distance.
- It sends gas leakage alert SMS to given number.
- In design of this device, quick response is achieved.
- Construction is easy.
- Easy to maintain and repair.
- Comparatively the operation cost is less. Design is efficient and low cost.
Power consumption is low.
