IoT Gas and Temperature Monitoring Interface of a Low Temperature Pyrolysis Reactor for the Production of Biochar

The Langara College Biochar Project consists on the use of a small pyrolysis reactor to convert a variety of biomass compounds into biochar. The current reactor lacks a monitoring interface to keep track of the different gas concentrations and the temperature of the kiln. This project aims to create a device that: communicates gas concentrations and temperatures from the pyrolytic reaction to a website; in the case of an emergency event, sends SMS alerts to the operator, and enables an actuator to shut off the reaction; and finally, stores data locally. The device used for data acquisition and manipulation was an Arduino Mega 2560, fitted with a Wi-Fi shield for the communications and data storage. Sensor wise, the Grove Multichannel Gas Sensor, DHT22, and TMP36, were employed for the measurement of gas concentrations, humidity, and temperature, respectively. ThingSpeak and IFTTT were used for the monitoring and alert system. The scope of this project was to provide a starting point to such a device by employing inexpensive components and laying out most of the software. As a consequence, our results were affected by cross-sensitivity between gas sensors. Regardless, the device is capable of displaying trend-lines for the concentration, sending them to a remote server, storing the data locally, and sending alerts when an emergency event occurs. Future iterations should employ a fully featured website and more precise sensors.