Santiago will have new technology available to measure air quality

Two novel instruments will make it possible to improve forecasts for episodes of environmental alert, pre-emergency and emergency, in order to prevent critical smog levels in the capital.

Air quality
This will represent a great achievement in environmental terms.

Good air quality gives people better chances of good health and quality of life. In the face of this tremendously important aspect of urban life, the authorities of Santiago decided to bring to Chile a new technology that will make it possible to optimize air quality forecasts and thus work on reducing CO2 emissions.

The two new instruments are: LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging), a remote sensing system that monitors atmospheric density in real time, among other functions. The other is new radio sounding balloons; these provide meteorological information up to an elevation of 10,000 meters, as well as indicating the stability of the local atmosphere and its evolution. The devices were introduced by the current governor of Santiago, Fernando Echeverría.

Together, these two instruments can improve the precision of the data for predicting episodes of air pollution alert, pre-emergency and emergency. This will represent a great achievement in environmental terms, because it is an effective measure to combat the effects of pollution.

The purchase of these devices involved an investment of 186 million Chilean pesos (close to US$ 360,000). They were both paid for by the Chilean Meteorological Directorate (DMC) and the National Commission for the Environment of the Metropolitan Region.

This post is also available in Spanish