Smart manhole toxic gas identification and alerting system

Abstract

Even nowadays, sewage systems are cleaned by the manual power. Somewhere they recently stated that “More Indians were dying in cleaning sewers than fighting terrorists in Kashmir”. Sewer gas is a composite amalgamation of venomous and non-hazardous gases, which is collected in sewage systems. Predominantly it also comprises that oxide of carbon, sulphur, nitrogen, ammonia and methane due to the decomposition of organic household or industrial wastes. During the maintenance practice, Sewer gases cause the health issues and fatal death to the labors also due to untreated disposal of petroleum products such as gasoline and mineral spirits. To conquer these impacts, in this proposed system, by using a set of integrated sensors MQ-4, MQ-7, MQ137 were incorporated with microcontroller unit process and LCD Display to quantify toxic gases which is produced in the system. It could be recognize the scale of toxicants and then intimated to the workers to acquire the safety precautions before entering into the manholes. The sensing range for the leak detection sensor should be from 300 ppm to 10,000 ppm. In order to reduce the toxic gases concentration, Sprinkler mechanism is provided with the resource chemical for detoxification treatment. Whenever the gas concentration level exceeds the specified threshold level, an actuator mechanism triggers the sprinkler. To upkeep the sewerage system and Prohibiting Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013, labors continually taking risk in their health and life. But they were paid for merely low wages. Despite proactive orders of the Supreme Court, the implementation of the directives remains unrealized, in the wake of frequent deaths. In this special episode of Banega Swachh India campaign, we take a look at how these deaths leave the workers’ family devastated and yet no one claims responsibility for the deaths.