Environmental Monitoring

Rapidly Detect Toxic Gases with No False Alarms

In order to maintain a level of security for populated buildings and protect critical infrastructure, a continuous air monitoring system should be employed in the air handling system for that building. Many possible terrorist threats have been identified by the Department of Homeland Security, among which is the use of Chemical Warfare Agents (CWAs) or Toxic Industrial Chemicals (TICs) to either harm building occupants or cause business disruptions. Initial schemes for CWA or TIC detection used monitoring technologies which have been found to lack the sensitivity or selectivity to make them useful against multiple chemical threat sources along with interferents such as common solvents and cleaners. These interferents often result in a large number of false alarms which are costly and reduce the overall effectiveness of the monitoring system. A continuous air analyzer should detect multiple agents very quickly with no, or extremely infrequent, false alarms to enhance the utility and security protection of these ambient air monitors for homeland security applications.