Hyundai Motor Company is planning to install fine particulate matter sensors inside of its cars so that these sensors can help passengers to operate ventilation or air purification systems if condition of air inside of a car is bad. Currently Hyundai Motor Company is carrying out related R&D with a goal of installing this sensor within two to three years.
According to industries on the 24th, Hyundai Motor Company’s Namyang R&D Center is currently carrying out a project with Sensirion, which is a company in Switzerland that specializes in sensors, regarding sensors that detect fine particulate matters that are floating in cars. Sensirion is a leading global company in high-performance state-of-the-art sensor that vie with Bosch from Europe and Asahi Kasai from Japan.
Reason why Hyundai Motor Company is looking to install fine particulate matter sensor inside of its cars is because people have become more aware of harmful air that is inside of cars.
According to research done by Duke University, Emory University, and Georgia Institute of Technology, amount of fine particulate matter that was collected inside of a car during commute is twice more than that of amount collected from road side. Amount of active oxygen and other harmful chemical substances inside of fine particulate matters was also twice as high. Fine particulate matters and harmful substances can cause respiratory and cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and dementia when one is exposed to them for long period of time.
Hyundai Motor Company is planning to develop sensors that can accurately detect fine particulate matters, harmful substances, and dusts that are produced from inside of cars that are introduced whenever windows are opened and link them with internal air purification systems. These sensors can alert passengers or drivers to open windows whenever amount of fine particulate matters and harmful substances exceed certain level or operate ventilation systems automatically.
Currently some luxury cars are installed with air purification systems. However none of the cars has yet to have fine particulate matter sensors inside of them because these sensors require high technical skills unlike regular sensors for houses.
“Inside of cars goes through extreme temperature changes in summer and winter.” said a representative for Korea Sensor Lab. “Because fine particulate matter sensor needs to show accurate sensing ability in any conditions, a barrier for reliability of sensors is very high.”
In order to secure reliability of sensors, Hyundai Motor Company and Sensirion are working on long-term R&D.
Unit cost is also a key factor. Most of dust sensors within air purifiers for houses are cheap Chinese products. However experts say that fine particulate matter sensors for cars that require high reliability and have high development cost will be expensive. Due to this reason, Hyundai Motor Company is planning to install sensors for its luxury cars first and slowly incorporate them to other cars.
It is heard that other automotive manufacturers such as Benz and BMW are also looking to install fine particulate matter sensors within their cars. All these interests towards quality of air within cars have become a global trend.
“Because many automotive manufacturers are showing interests towards fine particulate matter sensors, industries are interested on which automotive manufacturer will be able to introduce its products first.” said a representative for an industry. “Securing reliability of sensors is the most important factor.”
Staff Reporter Park, Sora | srpark@etnews.com