A Crowdsensing Platform for Monitoring of Vehicular Emissions: A Smart City Perspective

Historically, cities follow reactive planning models where managers make decisions as problems occur. On the other hand, the exponential growth of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) has allowed the connection of a diverse array of sensors, devices, systems, and objects. These objects can then generate data that can be transformed into information and used in a more efficient urban planning paradigm, one that allows decisions to be made before the occurrence of problems and emergencies. Therefore, this article aims to propose a platform capable of estimating the amount of carbon dioxide based on sensor readings in vehicles, indirectly contributing to a more proactive city planning based on the monitoring of vehicular pollution. Crowdsensing techniques and an On-Board Diagnostic (OBD-II) reader are used to extract data from vehicles in real time, which are then stored locally on the devices used to perform data collection. With the performed experiments, it was possible to extract information about the operation of the vehicles and their dynamics when moving in a city, providing valuable information that can support auxiliary tools for the management of urban centers.