Lord Drayson takes on UK air pollution crisis with new smart sensor
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Version 0 of 1. Millionaire businessman Lord Paul Drayson, a major Labour party donor, former science minister and self-confessed “car nut”, is moving on to his next environmental challenge: a hi-tech bid to tackle the UK’s air pollution crisis. The peer, who made a reported £80m fortune from a needle-free injection system, has already funded the development of a record-breaking electric car through his company Drayson Technologies. In September, he will launch a personal air quality sensor that he hopes will not only help people avoid the most polluted routes but also add to pressure on local and central government to act on the problem. London, Birmingham and Leeds are among the many UK cities that are not expected to meet EU safety limits on pollution until 2030. Tens of thousands of premature deaths each year are attributed to bad air quality by Public Health England, and a recent report commissioned by London mayor Boris Johnson blamed air pollution for killing nearly 9,500 people annually in the capital alone. Related: Nearly 9,500 people die each year in London because of air pollution – study “I’m an asthmatic, as are four of my children,” said Drayson. “My family lives in and around London, and I enjoying cycling and running. With access to the insight coming out of the development side of the business [Drayson Technologies], I became, like many others, acutely aware of the importance of air quality.” He said his fascination with the intersection of people and technology had led him to develop the CleanSpace service, which launches next month. It uses a £35 mobile-phone sized pollution sensor to talk via Bluetooth to an Android and IOS app that gives users reward points for biking or walking, rather than taking the car. Those points – ‘CleanMiles’ – can then be exchanged for rewards with the companies that Drayson is partnering with. Halfords is the first signed up, but he also hopes to target coffee shops and other businesses. Oil and gas companies won’t be in the partner scheme, he says. “What I learned from politics is you have to persuade people what they’re moving to is better, rather than scaring them,” he said. The sensor uses technology from Imperial College London and was developed in conjunction with air quality experts at King’s College London. It measures carbon monoxide levels as a surrogate for vehicle pollutants, such as fine particulates known as PM2.5s and a toxic gas, nitrogen dioxide, generated by diesel vehicles. “The first step is to fully recognise the scale of the problem through better data and knowledge,” Drayson said. He likened the network element of the service to the Israeli startup Waze, which shares data from smartphone users to build up a map of traffic hotspots and achieved enough critical mass that it was bought by Google. Anonymised data from a user’s pollution sensor will be shared with other users so they can see which pollution blackspots to avoid on their journey. Whether CleanSpace can persuade enough users to buy into its model will be its key challenge. Public air-quality monitors already feed data to free rival pollution apps, though Drayson believes the personal and granular data his sensor offers will be enough of a lure. The UK government has been forced by a supreme court ruling in April to draw up a plan of action on air pollution by the end of the year. But Drayson said a bottom-up approach is needed too, as public awareness of the crisis is still relatively low. “I think the effect of air pollution is still relatively underappreciated and there is work to do in raising awareness of the impact it has.” “Yes, the government has a role to play, but this isn’t solely a government issue to tackle. The best way to achieve change, and for legislation and regulation to work, is for it to grow from and reflect the beliefs and behaviours of the general public as a whole.” There are currently 250 people on a closed beta of the CleanSpace network ahead of its launch, but Drayson has a target of signing up 500,000 members across the UK. |