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Citing Polluting Vehicles Using Roadside Sensors 104

Posted by timothy from the winston-smith-was-a-a-smoker dept.
Makarand writes "A regional southern Californian law will soon allow installation of roadside sensors to measure pollutants from tailpipes as vehicles accelerate. The sensors would then activate a camera to photograph the license plates of vehicles whose emissions are too high and the owner would be notified to bring his vehicle for a smog check. This would ensure that if a vehicle has developed a problem and become a polluter, the owner cannot wait till the next smog check date to fix the problem. The plan is to have these sensors in place by year 2010. As of now, the state depends on the mandatory vehicle smog checks and the Highway Patrol and travelers to report smoking vehicles."
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Citing Polluting Vehicles Using Roadside Sensors More

Citing Polluting Vehicles Using Roadside Sensors

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  • subject (Score:2, Funny)

    by roseblood ( 631824 )
    I for one welcome our new electronic gas sniffing overlords!
    • Along with our RFID-happy school districts? Now we can drive to school in our Hummers and get yelled at for being late AND for polluting the environment!

  • 2010? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by john_is_war ( 310751 )
    2010? By then won't we be in our hydrogen fuel celled hybrid solar hover cars?

    • Re:2010? (Score:2, Interesting)

      by anubi ( 640541 )
      Yeh, there will probably be a lot of really nifty high technology cars out there by 2010.

      Remember though that California Law exempts cars over 30 years old from the smog tests. My take is that although these older antiques will still be legal to use on the road, the owner will be required to at least maintain the vehicle to such an extent that it doesn't make one helluva mess wherever it goes.

      I'm sure you've seen em.. just one car fogging up the entire area.. you would swear the guy is probably burning m

  • Do they honestly think this will work? Honestly? I mean, given the inherently unpredictable effects wind patterns, temperature, barometric pressure, precipitation, and even sunlight have on the often wildly fluctuating pollutant emissions coming from the cars in question, the false positive and false negative rates will make lie detectors look valid by comparison. And of course there will be no compensation for the driver if the sensor is triggered inappropriately.

    Thank God I don't live in southern Califor
    • Probably will work better than citizens reporting cars, as they do now.

    • Re: I am in shock and awed (Score:5, Informative)

      by Yokaze ( 70883 ) on Saturday October 25, 2003 @01:43PM (#7308644)
      To my limited knowledge, spectroscopy is the method of choice of measuring pollution in exhaust of plants.

      AFAIK, a LASER directed on the chute and measuring the reflected spectrum deliver accurate data on various gases (CO,SO2...)

      The external factors you have named maybe unpredictable, but are measurable and the systematical errors and statistical errors stemming from them can be measured and accounted for.

      I may be wrong, I only remember it from something I've heard 5-10 years ago.
      In that case, please enlighten me.

      The report was something along this line:
      Before such systems, govermental agencies checking the exhaust of plants had to build up an apparatus at the site (at the exhaust). The arrival of the agency at the site gave the operator the signal change the settings, so that they pass the inspection, which usually operated at a cheaper and less cleaner moed.
      The (at that time) new system fitted into a van. They just had to drive some hundred meters near to the chute, with a line-of-sight, pointed the LASER at the exhaust and read the print-out, which listed the PPM of the pollutants.
      • You are absolutely and totally correct- except that plants don't move, and emissions from plants travel at a fixed distance and usually a fixed speed between the source of the emissions and the sensor. On the road, there is no such guarantee, and the sensor- and the emission source- is subject to orders of magnitude more variability and much more environmental exposure, and hence a great deal more likelihood of false reports.

        Now, if the spectroscopic sensor were embedded in the tailpipe or mounted on the b
        • Since they are speaking about "using roadside sensors to measure pollutants spewing from tailpipes as vehicles accelerate", I assume, they either plan to measure the exhaust at the tailpipe of a still standing car, when it begins to drive. This is practically a still standing target. And AFAIK, it is the point where a car emits the second most pollution per time (after the initial start).

          The next thing is, how does a moving car differ from a still standing plant with wind (In a small time intervall)?
          And ho
      • The thing to keep in mind about your laser spectroscope: It doesn't measure the amount of pollutants coming out of the exhaust pipe. It measures the amount of pollutants between the laser emitter and the sensor - this is a two way trip thru dozens or hundreds of feet of air that is also being polluted by all nearby vehicles, including the metro bus right in front of you that belched an opaque cloud as it pulled away from the stop. The same metro bus that is probably exempt from pollution controls. I don'
  • And on a hot day? Is this going to take an average sample at any point? Keep in mind, on a hot day, the pavement itself is going to be giving off a fair ammount of pollutant. On a hot day, with heavy traffic, an average sampling of background pollutants is going to be significantly higher than on a cold day with minimal traffic.
    And as for this:
    Many cities have cameras with sensors at traffic lights, which have led to a slew of motorist complaints.
    Apples and oranges. Issuing a moving violation require

    • Keep in mind that, although the system may not be 100% accurate, it is not intended to be used to issue citations. It is only intended to identify probable violations and then call the owners of those vehicles in for an accurate test. This is in the interest of the people of California because it can improve their health and prevent them from losing federal funding due to exceeding air pollution limits.

      Issuing a moving violation requires an arrest to be made. The camera is technically the arresting offic

  • hmm (Score:2)

    by pmsyyz ( 23514 )
    Is that cloud of diesel fumes from the dump truck in front of me going to affect it?

  • Arizona has had this for years (Score:3, Informative)

    by Lord Byron II ( 671689 ) on Sunday October 26, 2003 @12:41AM (#7312054)
    We tried this several years ago in Arizona. They had vans they rolled out with equipment on the entrances to the freeway system. As you rolled over a wire, a sensor would take a sniff and snap your photo. I think that the policy was to only issue a demand for inspection after 12 of these tests were failed. I haven't seen the vans around in some time (the last couple of years). If I had to guess why, I'd say it was probably because they weren't very effective or accurate.
  • I wonder about how long these things will work without maintenance before they clog up. I mean, nice summer day, clean roads, it will be fine. But throw in some dirt+rain=mud, or even snow, and they aren't going to last long. The article is sitting on "Loading" still so I guess that I won't be able to check up on the article, but I'd it a somewhat safe assumption that the devices have to be somewhat near ground-level in order to pick up significant readings.

  • Assume the sensors work. Great, so you catch a pollutor... what next? They get a citation or recommendation in the mail. Is there a recourse or punishment for non-compliance, or do they just collect citations until their required emissions test?

    Further, what about vehicles that are exempt from current emmisions tests, like Mack trucks. Semis and other large vehicles produce a lot more emmisions than smaller cars, and they're often exempt from emmisions tests (I'm not sure about California).

    There are a

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