Yogurt Carts Double as Fine Dust Monitors | Be Korea-savvy

Yogurt Carts Double as Fine Dust Monitors


SK Telecom Co. announced on Monday that it will be introducing a fine dust mapping service called Everyair developed in collaboration with Korea Yakult and Winix. (image: SK Telecom)

SK Telecom Co. announced on Monday that it will be introducing a fine dust mapping service called Everyair developed in collaboration with Korea Yakult and Winix. (image: SK Telecom)

SEOUL, Oct. 10 (Korea Bizwire) Some 10,000 yogurt carts — small movable vending stations selling yogurt products that are ubiquitous in South Korean towns and cities — will be used as platforms to measure fine dust levels across the country.

SK Telecom Co. announced on Monday that it will be introducing a fine dust mapping service called Everyair developed in collaboration with Korea Yakult and Winix.

Everyair is a mapping service that provides information on the outdoor and indoor status of fine dust available for all mobile users regardless of their mobile carrier.

By downloading the application, users can gain access to real-time data on air quality measured by Winix’s AirBees, mobile fine dust measuring devices attached to Coco, Korea Yakult’s yogurt carts, that monitor the layer of air that most people breathe in.

Everyair users can easily get a glimpse of the overall status of air quality including fine dust, ultra-fine dust, ozone levels, carbon monoxide, and nitrogen dioxide.

Each region of the country is shown in different colors based on the air quality level. Users can select favorite regions to view them more easily and quickly.

SK Telecom will be responsible for developing and running Everyair’s service platforms.

On top of air quality sensors already installed at some 1,000 dealership stores around South Korea, SK Telecom plans to install additional sensors at approximately 200 Wi-Fi stations indoors and outdoors to monitor fine dust and share data.

Korea Yakult will oversee the installation of air quality sensors on its yogurt carts to measure air quality when the carts are in activity.

The company plans to increase the number of air quality carts from today’s 500 carts to as many as 10,000 by next year, in a bid to monitor air quality more closely.

Yogurt carts are approximately one meter in height, as tall as young children.

The new service hopes to attract parents with younger children who care about the quality of the air that their children breathe in.

Winix will be responsible for the development and distribution of AirBee, a mobile fine dust measuring device that syncs with Everyair. AirBee helps private users check fine dust levels anywhere and anytime.

SK Telecom explained that data measured at various locations around the country is transferred to a central server in real-time.

This data is then combined with public air quality data from the Korea Environmental Corporation to create Everyair’s map of fine dust.

Cho Young-hoon, chief of the home business unit at SK Telecom, said that the three companies were working together “to make contributions to public health by designing a precise and closely measured map of fine dust that can serve as a platform to resolve the fine dust problem.”

H. M. Kang (hmkang@koreabizwire.com)

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