Brief:
“This year’s Future Lions theme is a call for young people to protect what is most important about our home planet – life itself.
For All Life with Volvo Cars – How can we pioneer the use of technology to protect people and make them feel safe?”
+ MARCH 2023
SHORTLIST FUTURE LIONS 2023
This idea haunts me everytime I see a headline about a wildfire.
Modern Volvo’s carry a “Air Quality Sensor” (AQS). This is a great feature in areas with poor air quality as it purifies the air inside your car before you enter it. It also provides the current status of air quality, determined by the amount of particles caught by the car’s built-in PM2.5 filter.
PM2.5 particles is a major component of wildfire smoke, meaning that the AQS could detect wildfire in its early stage if a Volvo happens to pass by and notice the sudden spike.
Currently, wildfires are detected by satelite images and human observers posted in the wilderness. With Volvo Fireward we’d be adding a third line of defense; every human road.
This idea should be cheap, easy to deploy and, to me, seems like it would repay itself the moment a Volvo Car made headlines for detecting a wildfire.