Pedion24

The scope of pedion24 project is information of the public about the levels of electromagnetic radiation in various areas of Greece. Monitoring stations measure on a 24 hour basis the total electromagnetic field emitted from different sources such as fm and television broadcasts and cellular telephony base stations, giving the ability to the public of immediate and reliable information regarding the levels of electromagnetic radiation at any time. The data collected from the stations are stored on a database and can be viewed at any time.

On a first basis the system is operating on municipalities of Attica with the prospective of an expansion throughout Greece. Locations of monitoring stations are carefully chosen to cover places of special interest (schools, hospitals, nurseries and areas with high population density).

The experience of the project workgroup of Mobile Radiocommunications Laboratory of National Technical University of Athens ensures the integrity of the measurements which are immediately published on the web.

The system consists of:

- Electromagnetic field monitoring stations installed in various locations.

- A control centre located on the Mobile Radiocommunications Laboratory.

Monitoring stations are equipped with certified probes which every 6 minutes record and store in station’s memory a value of environmental electromagnetic field (measured in Volts per meter – V/m). Every 24 hours the stations communicate with the control centre and send the data collected throughout the day (24 hours x 10 measurements per hour = 240 values of electric field per day). In order to communicate both the stations and the control centre are equipped with GSM modems. Monitoring stations are also remotely controlled through the GSM network (error and malfunction management, remote access etc.)

After daily data is collected from all monitoring stations, measurements are stored in a database on the control centre. Standard users can communicate with the database, look up and view measured electric field values of any location for the time period of their choice, in simple charts. In these charts users can view the measured rms values of electric field (unit - V/m) for the frequency band from 100 kHz up to 3 GHz, along with the limit values for the exposure of the general public to electromagnetic fields instituted by the Greek state (Law 3431/2006 – 22.4 V/m for the FM frequency band which is the most rigorous limitation for the entire band 100 kHz-3GHz, 33 V/m for the GSM 900MHz frequency band, 45.7 V/m for the GSM 1800MHz and UMTS frequency band).

Monitoring stations are equipped with e-field probes which record every 3 seconds an rms value of electric field and calculate a mean rms value of electric field for a time period of 6 minutes (as defined by the EU 1999/519/EC and ICNIRP directives). The probes are certified and fully complied with European standards.

The website of the program Pedion24 is http://www.pedion24.gr