Going somewhere but want to avoid high pollution levels there? Well, now your smartphone can help you get the pollution level of any area even before stepping out of home. Helpchat mobile phone app provides alerts about pollution level early morning.
Bengaluru-based personal assistant app Helpchat has launched a new feature on its app that provides alerts when the air quality drops below a certain threshold.
Helpchat has started this pollution alert in over 40 Indian cities where the app users will be given two basic information -one about the air quality index (AQI) in the area and; secondly warning about at least two highly-polluted places.
The app presents readings of the AQI (Air Quality Index) index, sourced from Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) as the primary source, and mashes it up with secondary sources, said Vishal Pal Chaudhary, Co-Founder and CTO at Helpchat.
“The idea was to highlight the places the user should be avoiding, based on location data,” he said.
Helpchat presents air quality data along with deals, movies, and weather updates on the app’s home screen. The app uses the Air Quality Index as a key data point, which translates air quality into a number ranging from 0 to 500. The index is colour-graded in six categories from green to red (Good, Satisfactory, Moderately polluted, Poor, Very Poor, Severe). Apart from PM10, PM2.5 particles, the data is also derived by monitoring nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide, ozone, ammonia, and lead content in the air.