Sensorized buoy for oil spill early detection

The Sea is often a fragile environment to be protected against possible pollutants. In this context, the present work contributes to its safeguard by proposing a new buoy equipped with advanced sensors for the detection of oil spills. In particular, the buoy is provided with various sensors for the evaluation of both meteorological and marine parameters (e.g. waves, wind, temperature), and chemical/physical data acquired by an electronic nose system specifically designed for the detection of hydrocarbons. The electronic nose is composed of a flow chamber, a chamber equipped with photo ionization sensors, pumps and valves for air inlet and outlet, and a low-cost electronic board. The designed system samples the air above the water and produces data that are processed through two artificial neural networks allowing for a classification of detected hydrocarbons and overall pollution level. Suitable network interfaces and a connector toward a Marine Information System (MIS) allow both for real-time data visualization and for long-term assessment of water quality.