An Alarm-Based LPG Leakage Monitoring System

Abstract

Purpose: Gas leakages have posed a major safety threat in the society especially in homes. Devices for early detection of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) popularly used in many developing countries are not so common and costly when available. This paper proposes a low-cost alarm-based LPG leakage monitoring system for home safety.
 Materials and Methods: It uses MQ-6 gas sensor with PIC16F877A microcontroller circuit powered by a 9VDC battery to sustain the system even when the main power is out. The microcontroller is connected to an LCD screen and a buzzer to show the alerting part. An exhaust fan is connected at the output in order to disperse the gas away from the ignition source. Different quantities of the gas and perfume (for comparison) were measured and used for the test and the response time was observed. The system was designed and first simulated successfully using Proteus 8 before hardware implementation.
 Findings: The results show that for high, medium and low concentration of LPG, the average response times obtained are 0.78s, 1.05s and 1.95s respectively. Similarly, for the perfume tested at different volumes ranging from 11ml to 29ml, the corresponding average response times range from 1.95s to 0.61s. The results show that for both tests, the average response time reduces with concentration. The higher the concentration, the shorter the time to raise the alarm. The cost analysis of the system shows that it is affordable for domestic use. Further work can involve control actuator such as solenoid to cut off the gas supply.