In September 2019, the City Council unanimously directed staff to draft and send a letter to SMC Labs, a division of San Mateo County, requesting placement of air quality monitors in the Belle Haven neighborhood. Today, three air quality sensors went live in Menlo Park.

SMC Labs began a pilot program in early 2019 with ten Clarity air quality sensors. The initial locations focused on areas with more vulnerable populations, as well as those needed to provide robust coverage of the community. Given the significant traffic and associated air pollution surrounding the Belle Haven neighborhood due to U.S. 101, Bayfront Expressway and Willow Road, the new sensors aim to collect air quality data that will provide a better understanding of air quality concerns in our area.

Clarity Node sensors measure air quality data that is shared and mapped on openmap.clarity.io. Clarity devices are FCC/CE certified, UV-resistant and weatherproof. They include solar charging, an internal battery and cellular communications. 

Clarity's Remote Calibration service is supported by dozens of co-locations with governmental reference monitoring sites across the globe. Clarity uses the U.S. EPA's Nowcast method for calculating AQI to comply with CalOSHA regulations and enable critical decision-making. Clarity uses cloud analytics to calibrate data from each of its monitors for air quality events like wildfire smoke. After applying adjustments for wildfire smoke in California, the calibrated devices are twice as accurate as uncalibrated low-cost sensors when assigning air quality to the appropriate AQI category.

Other indicative/low-cost monitors overestimate air quality by 50-60%. Data from these monitors should only be used after a rigorous calibration process to ensure data accuracy.