Overview

The Black Cloud Citizen Science League developed cheerful “Pufftron” sensors to measure CO2, VOC’s, Light, Noise and Temperature in distinct locations in Los Angeles and the Bay Area. To see current air quality, click on the image links to the right. Current highlights are Berkeley's Zellerbach Hall main stage, a porch next to a certain "Pure" Rocky Mountain Brewery and the Machine Project Gallery in Los Angeles.

Dream and Machine

Pollution is not like weather, it is something we do. So instead of showing weathermap-style air information, we scale air quality down to a scale where you can effect change. The Citizen Science League (led by Greg Niemeyer) offers the data that motivates change, and suggests some ways to fix the air. The League also maintains The Daily Polluter, where you can share air quality improvement stories. The sensor itself runs on 110VAC, and sends air measurements to our server through a built-in SMS device.

Membership

You can join the League by hosting a sensor yourself. Just contact us by email(niemeyer at berkeley punto edu), to suggest a sensor location. All you need to provide is 110 VAC power and reasonable cellphone reception. If you just like our Cloudy McPufferson logo, please contact us and ask for the patch. After the Los Angeles and Bay Area studies, the League will release its next set of sensors in Cairo, Egypt.

Press

Nate Berg wrote a detailed review about us at Planetizen. There's also a nice summary on Inhabitat, another great green blog and online resource.

Credits

The Black Cloud project is the public part of the work we did with Andy Garcia’s English class at Manual Arts High School this summer. Funds for the project are provided by a Digital Media Learning Grant from the MacArthur Foundation.

The Black Cloud Citizen Science League is organized by: Rhea Cortado (Costume Designer), Aida Eltorie (Arts Manager), Andy Garcia (Teacher, Manual Arts High School), Laura Greig (Artist/Programmer), Farley Gwazda (Artist), Nik Hanselmann (Programmer/Artist), Reza Naima (Hardware Engineer), Greg Niemeyer (Principal Investigator) and Daye Rogers (Video Documentary).