Development of a cabin air quality monitor for airplanes based on a combination of ion mobility spectrometer and other sensors for the European AECS project

Description:
AECS (Adaptive Environmental Control System) is a research project funded by the European “Clean Sky 2 Joint Undertaking” program.
Current aircraft ventilation systems rely on a prescribed amount of fresh air per passenger to dilute contaminants generated within the aircraft cabin, to provide adequate oxygen and to maintain cabin pressure. Contaminants generated inside the cabin are CO2, off-gassing VOCs from items and other chemicals from flight activities such as catering. Contaminants generated outside the cabin include environmental compounds such as SO2, NO2, O3, hydrocarbons from combustion, aerosols, particulates or de-icing fluids. Additionally, “fume events” involving engine oil mist have been reported widely in the last years.
Typically, fresh air is supplied by the compressors of the main propulsion engines (engine bleed) through a ducting system. As there is energy required for conditioning outside air, modern aircraft utilize recirculated air, which is typically filtered to remove particulates, however gaseous specials are usually not removed. The idea is to reduce fuel consumption through the adaptive ventilation by providing only the amount of fresh air as required. To achieve this goal in particular an air quality sensor module was developed.
The following presentation will address the defined contaminates which have to be monitored. The array of different gas sensors, based on a combination of an ion mobility spectrometer (IMS), a dedicated electrochemical cell (EC), an infrared absorption sensor (IR) and a photo-ionization-detector (PID), as well as the selected particulate sensors for small particles (PM10), fine particles (PM2.5) and ultrafine particles (PM0.1) will be described.
Data showing the detection of undesirable gases, particulates and aerosols as well as detection limits and response times of the system will be shown. The capability for integration into an environmental control system of an airplane will be discussed.

Speaker: Andreas Walte - Airsense Analytics