Sewer-sniffing IoT could provide early warning for COVID-19 outbreaks – Cities Today – Connecting the world’s urban leaders
Following pilots, smart wastewater management company Kando says its system can act as a ‘blood test’ to help cities prevent a second wave of COVID-19 and support targeted actions rather than full-scale lockdowns. It identifies traces of the virus from human faeces in municipal wastewater.
Kando’s technology, which is already used for wastewater pollution detection in Modena, Italy; El Paso, Texas; Ventura, California; and Athens, Greece, uses sensors, autosamplers and controllers placed under manholes. Artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms pinpoint the optimum time to automatically collect samples.