[HN Gopher] Infineon's CO2 Sensor Monitors Indoor Air Quality
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       Infineon's CO2 Sensor Monitors Indoor Air Quality
        
       Author : WaitWaitWha
       Score  : 42 points
       Date   : 2024-09-21 19:08 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.allaboutcircuits.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.allaboutcircuits.com)
        
       | vardump wrote:
       | Finally an actually working (cheap?) CO2 sensor?
       | 
       | So many of those actually measure humidity, temp and VOCs and try
       | to derive some sort of CO2 reading out of those.
        
         | IgorPartola wrote:
         | This was my thought exactly. I used sensors that were about
         | $25/each in the past and those worked well but this would be
         | seemingly way easier to integrate and get ahold of.
        
           | vardump wrote:
           | $25 for a CO2 sensor component that actually works is not bad
           | at all.
        
             | tobi1449 wrote:
             | Sensirion SCD41 should be pretty good, right? You can get
             | them for ~25 USD on aliexpress ...
        
               | ale42 wrote:
               | I'm not sure I would source non-Chinese electronic
               | components from Aliexpress... (unless it's just to play
               | with them, definitely not for a product): you might need
               | to check their reliability and quality. Pretty sure that
               | Sensirion themselves are not selling there, so they are
               | probably either clones, fakes, recycled ones, or if you
               | are lucky authentic ones that for some reason ended up
               | there (but I can't imagine a way).
        
         | fuzzy2 wrote:
         | Sensirion has the SCD40, which appears to be based on the same
         | principle. It's much cheaper than the SCD30.
        
           | _blk wrote:
           | Yes, SCD30 series are optical while SCD40 series are
           | photoacoustic. STC series are thermal conductivity based. STC
           | and SCD40 are smaller than SCD30 but less accurate if memory
           | serves (check datasheet).
        
         | rainburg wrote:
         | The Senseair S88, which was released earlier this year, costs
         | ~$22/piece, or ~$13/piece if you order more than 100.
        
         | tzs wrote:
         | It's not really "finally". They introduced a similar sensor,
         | the PASCO2V01, a couple years ago. That one has been available
         | on a breakout board with the necessary support hardware from
         | SparkFun for over a year [1].
         | 
         | Comparing the datasheets for the PASCO2V01 and the new
         | PASCO2V15 the old one actually seems a little better as far as
         | CO2 measuring performance goes. They are the same on most
         | things, but the old one has slightly better accuracy.
         | 
         | The new one is +-(50 ppm + 5%) between 400 ppm and 3000 ppm.
         | 
         | The old one is +-(30 ppm + 3%) between 400 ppm and 5000 ppm.
         | 
         | The big difference is this:
         | 
         | > Infineon has recently introduced the PASCO2V15, a new 5 V
         | sensor to improve air quality monitoring in building
         | environments.
         | 
         | Both of them require a dual voltage power supply. They both
         | want 3.3 V for their digital components and a higher voltage
         | for their IR emitter.
         | 
         | For the older one that higher voltage is 12 V. For the newer it
         | is 5 V.
         | 
         | [1] https://www.sparkfun.com/products/22956
        
           | fnordpiglet wrote:
           | Iirc they were merged into esphome last year too.
        
         | Animats wrote:
         | True. The cheap ones are trying to guess CO2. Those are called
         | "indoor air quality sensors".
         | 
         | Small CO2 sensors have been available for years, for about $50.
         | Compare [1].
         | 
         | Life of this new device is only 10 years, which is short for
         | HVAC systems. A hotel might have a thousand of these. Older
         | devices say "15+" years.
         | 
         | All these devices have a calibration problem. They drift. They
         | try to correct by treating the lowest value they ever see as
         | "normal" (that's about 400 ppm CO2 today, vs 300 PPM in 1950)
         | and recalibrating. So they're not useful for observing a
         | general increase in CO2. They're also not useful for
         | greenhouses, where CO2 levels may drop below ambient CO2 due to
         | photosynthesis. Manual recalibration is possible but requires
         | feeding in pure nitrogen and a known nitrogen/CO2 mixture.[2]
         | 
         | Devices which don't need that re-calibration exist.[3] They're
         | more complicated. Also don't seem to be stocked by the usual
         | distributors.
         | 
         | [1]
         | https://rmtplusstoragesenseair.blob.core.windows.net/docs/pu...
         | 
         | [2] https://www.co2meter.com/blogs/news/7512282-co2-sensor-
         | calib...
         | 
         | [3] https://www.murata.com/en-
         | us/products/sensor/co2/overview/te...
        
       | nimish wrote:
       | They've had a 12v version for a while, and it's quite nice
       | despite the high voltage requirement. I made a little breakout
       | with a boost converter. Sensirion has a slightly smaller sensor
       | as well, SCD41 that I think works on similar principles.
       | 
       | Neither are cheap, around $25-40 each in small quantities. The
       | infineon one has a full blown microcontroller handling the
       | operation of the sensors.
       | 
       | To keep accuracy you would need to have a CO2 gas setup which
       | isn't cheap either, but for indoor use I don't think it matters.
        
       | shadowpho wrote:
       | Have been using scd30/31/40. Great sensors. This one requires a
       | bit more power but would be interesting to see price as it seems
       | it actually measured CO2. (A lot of other sensors simulate it
       | with measuring alcohols and assume people breathing which gives
       | poor results)
        
       | clumsysmurf wrote:
       | I worked in a building 500 ft from a busy highway and when I
       | cleaned my desk it always had black dust on it.
       | 
       | Along these lines of air quality, can anyone recommend a
       | similarly advanced PM2.5 / PM10 sensor under $100 / ea?
        
         | trog wrote:
         | I haven't gotten their PM sensor unit but have a CO2 sensor
         | from CO2.click. About to pull the trigger on a PM sensor but
         | just deciding which one. The founder there is active on a few
         | places including Mastodon and I really like my CO2 sensor from
         | them.
         | 
         | Edit: sorry missed your price guidance. They are quite a bit
         | more so probably not what you're after!
        
         | christina97 wrote:
         | Have been using a Plantower PMS5003 for a while with ESPhome
         | and it's pretty good.
        
       | dzhiurgis wrote:
       | Would be nice if they packaged these up in laptops - fan is
       | already there and always running.
        
       | Genbox wrote:
       | Datasheet can be found here:
       | https://www.infineon.com/dgdl/Infineon-PASCO2V15-DataSheet-v...
        
       | FL33TW00D wrote:
       | I've been considering designing a wearable that monitors CO2 and
       | PM2.5 continuously, but I'm unsure if people would wear it in
       | conjunction with an Apple Watch or similar.
        
         | crazygringo wrote:
         | I'm not sure how accurate that would be on your wrist, because
         | the proportion of recently exhaled air would be so much higher,
         | since it's only a foot or two from your mouth.
         | 
         | CO2 monitors often have little silent fans to draw in fresh air
         | as well, for accuracy.
        
           | christina97 wrote:
           | I don't think it'd make a difference. I've got one on my desk
           | in front of me and can't detect a difference with me at the
           | desk vs not.
        
         | triwats wrote:
         | This is super interesting for me - but I'd love to put it on a
         | bicycle (they are often locked up and stationary - for example)
         | but move at faster speeds. Maybe this means they are only
         | useful at tracking information when locked/stationary?
         | 
         | I really like the idea of using cheap (?) devices in a sort of
         | mesh to feed back telemetry data on pollution. Pollution is
         | everyone's concern, so visualising that would be cool.
         | 
         | Interested to hear if you had any more thoughts on this!
        
       | OldGuyInTheClub wrote:
       | Nice to see this miniaturization of photoacoustic spectroscopy -
       | something I've done a bit of in the past. It is an
       | underappreciated technique. Ordinarily one measures the
       | difference in optical throughput with and without a sample. If it
       | is a weak absorber, it is a difference between two large numbers.
       | PAS is zero background. No absorption, no pressure wave, no
       | signal. Any absorption stands out clearly against that zero
       | background.
        
       | babl-yc wrote:
       | Seems similar to the SCD40 photoacoustic approach.
       | 
       | I used that for an open-source CO2 monitor I designed:
       | 
       | https://bitclock.io/
       | 
       | https://github.com/goat-hill/bitclock
        
       | JSDevOps wrote:
       | https://aranet.com/en/home/products/aranet4-home?srsltid=Afm...
        
         | elliottkember wrote:
         | Like that, but cheaper and more accurate.
        
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