Trim Air Quality Monitoring – Co. Meath

Funded by DRCD Digital Innovation Programme 2021 and Meath County Council
Funding awarded: €163,518

Contact details:
Meath County Council, Trim Decarbonisation Zone, and URBACT
E: sociotech@trilateralresearch.com
P: 046 9097000

Who: Trim, a town in County Meath, is situated along the banks of the River Boyne. The area boasts an array of monuments, historical places, and modern shopping and leisure amenities. As the urban population of Trim has grown, so has commuting, and the effects of climate change have become more pronounced. In County Meath, 78% of residents work outside of their county, potentially exacerbating pollution due to increased commuting. Urban air quality poses a health risk and causes damage to buildings and cultural landmarks. To proactively safeguard the community from the adverse effects of pollution, Meath County Council, the local authority responsible for Trim, set about monitoring Trim’s air quality to determine urban air pollution impact. By deploying sensors to establish a baseline for air quality, they will now have the data necessary to manage and mitigate any future increase in air pollution.

Objectives to:

• Establish a baseline for air quality in Trim
• Gather and store data regarding air quality
• Prevent the development of health issues related to exposure to urban air pollution
• Develop an air quality index for Trim

What: Meath County Council installed air quality sensors around Trim to gather data on the condition of air quality and monitor changes. By collecting this data, it will be possible to inform further policy on climate change solutions and interventions likely to be successful. Thereby air quality will improve and emissions will be lower. Trilateral Research is assisting with this project using its Sociotech approach to assess the requirements for risk and analytics. This approach involves combining expertise in data science, social science, data engineering, data protection, ethics, software development, cloud computing and UI/UX to understand the issue comprehensively and to develop better solutions.

Why: This project aims to create an air quality record to understand how societal changes affect local air quality. Achieving air quality improvements will require data to inform interventions likely to be successful. Enhancing the experience of living in a town, Trim is an exemplar in utilising digitalisation for improved quality of life delivery.

Scale: Trim town

Technologies: Cloud-based data capture and analytics platform, air quality sensors, STRIAD® cloud-based SaaS web application.

Impact and Lessons Learned: N/A.

UN Sustainable Development Goals: