An Ultra-Low-Power-Consumption Urban Sewer Methane Concentration Monitoring System Based on Ultrasound

Abstract

Methane is the main cause of sewer explosion accidents, and the available monitoring methods mainly use portable gas sensors for on-site detection. However, these methods cannot grasp the dynamic changes in methane in a sewer in real time or make good predictions of methane explosion accidents. Here, we present a low-power online monitoring system for sewer methane in order to ensure the safety of urban sewers. A low-power ultrasonic gas sensor was used to monitor the methane content in biogas. Due to the impacts of changes in CO2, temperature, and humidity in the sewer on the ultrasonic methane measurement results, a corresponding compensation method was proposed. The effectiveness of the compensation method was verified through experiments, which measured the methane concentration under different influences, and the methane values measured before and after compensation were compared. The power consumption was only 1.28 mW when the system worked in intermittent operation mode, and it could operate for about 1.5 years using a lithium battery with a capacity of 5 Ah. The experimental results showed that gas detection accuracy could meet commercial requirements and compensated for the impacts of carbon dioxide, temperature, and humidity.