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Smart Gas Leakage Detection with Monitoring and
Automatic Safety System
S.M. Zinnuraain1 , Mahmudul Hasan2 , and Md. Akramul Hakque3 , and Mir Mohammad Nazmul Arefin4
1,2,3,4 Department
of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, American International
University-Bangladesh (AIUB), 408/1, Kuratoli, Khilkhet, Dhaka 1229, Bangladesh
1 syedzinnuraain@gmail.com 2 hsnmaah@gmail.com 3 shykot208@gmail.com 4 mnarefin@aiub.edu
Abstract—In this paper, we have proposed a LPG (Liquified
Petroleum Gas) leakage detection with monitoring and automatic
safety system. With the drastically increased demand and use of
LPG, this system would be helpful to monitor the usage of LPG
on a regular basis and to take safety about any hazards that
may occur due to LPG leakage. We have designed a system that
notify the user using IOT (Internet of Things) through mobile
app about the amount of LPG so that appropriate measures
can be taken. Since LPG is a highly hazardous and inflammable
gas, we have also designed a safety system to with the help of
IOT (Internet of Things) through mobile app, when any leakage
occurs in LPG so that necessary safety can be taken to avoid an
explosion.
Index Terms—Node-MCU ESP8266, Internet of Thinks (IOT),
Automatic safety system, Gas cylinder Measurement.
I. I NTRODUCTION
LPG gas is a mixture of hydrocarbon gases like propane or
butane. It comes from the natural gas processing and petroleum
refining. LPG is liquefied under moderate pressure and has
replaced many conventional fuel systems in household and
commercial sectors. It is the mostly used fuels in household,
commercial. Industrial appliances, it has an explosive range
of 1.8%–9.5% volume of gas in air. The Household cate-
gory of LPG cylinder contains 14.2 kg LPG in the cylinder.
Similarly, the Commercial and Industrial categories of LPG
cylinders contain 19 and 35 kg of LPG respectively. The LPG
is filled only up to 85% in these cylinders above which will
be vapors. This is due to the expansion property of the LPG
and consequently, contributes as a safety precaution to avoid
any hazards. For every 1 rise in temperature, the pressure of

LPG inside the cylinder will increase by 15 kg/cm3 . Which
makes the LP gas cylinder more dangerous and extremely
inflammable gas [1].
With the increasing demand of LP gas users, most of the
time user have to face many dangerous accidents occurs by gas
leakage due to inappropriate and unavailable of timely action.
In such a situation an efficient method to establish a safety
system as well as monitor the level of LPG in the cylinder is
required, so that the users are aware of the LPG level within
the cylinder. They can take the initiative to stop the leakage
and can take necessary steps to in booking a new cylinder. In
this era, where everything is powered by electricity, a small
spark in the premises during LPG leakage is more than enough
to cause an explosion. So, it is highly necessary that the users
978-1-5386-9279-0/19/$31.00 2019
c IEEE
are aware of the necessary precautions to be taken during an
LPG leakage [1], [2].
A large amount of research has been going based on LP
gas leakage detection and protection system. In the era of
technology development brings an efficient and effective tech-
nology. Johnson-Williams Instruments founded the first gas
detection technology in the year 1928 by developing a com-
pany. The owners of J-W instruments were Dr. Oliver Johnston
and Phil Williams. J-W Instruments the first electronics com-
pany for gas detection in Silicon Valley. More than 40 year
they were successful as, the company made a huge impact in
gas detections. They were successful to make the instruments
more portable and user friendly and were able to make first
combination instrument that could detect both combustible
gases/vapors as well as oxygen. In the 1980s and 1990s, before
the development of electronic household, by detectors of car-
bon monoxide presence of carbon monoxide was detected with
a chemically infused paper that turned brown when exposed
to the gas [3]. Since then, many electronic technologies and
devices have been developed to detect, monitor, and alert the
leak of a wide array of gases under instantaneously. The above
research and talks with eminent engineers from various indus-
tries laid the foundation for gathering information about the
proposed system.
The proposed system is an effective combination of dual
features which are manufactured in a cost-effective way. The
paper discusses the all requirements and methods of imple-
mentation for the proposed system. Introduction is followed
by brief description of the components and their working
principle in Section II. In the following sections, the system
operation and experimental results are described. Necessary
figures are included for further clarity with a closing note on
how the system can be improved in the future.
II. SMART G AS D ETECTION W ITH M ONITORING
AND AUTOMATIC S AFETY S YSTEM
The proposed smart gas leakage detection with automatic
safety system comprises of two sensors, an Arduino mega, an
LCD display, solenoid valve, Node-MCU and a Blynk mobile
app which is being powered by a power supply. Refer to
Fig. 1 for the block diagram of the proposed system.
The proposed system is powered by 220V AC power supply.
which is converted into a rectified 12 V DC supply. Using an
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Fig. 1. Block diagram of proposed system.

adapter, the 12 V supply is lowered to 5 V and is used in the

proposed system.
MQ-2, a sensor which has characteristic to detect the LP gas
whose elements are propane and butane is used in proposed
system. It can also sense carbon-monoxide and smoke.
Being a highly sensible for LP gas detection, it has concentra-
tion range of 300–10000 ppm [4]. MQ-2 outer membrane is
Tin Di-oxide (SnO2 ) that made MQ-2 as an electro-chemical
sensor which changes its resistance for different concentra-
tions of varied gasses, results in an output which is converted
into an electrical voltage. This electrical voltage further con-
verted and processed through micro-controller. With the help
of micro-controller, output values indicates the user about the
gas leakage [5].
A load cell is a transducer which converts force into a mea-
surable electrical output based on the principle that an applied
force on it changes the value of resistance within, resulting
in a corresponding voltage as a result of unbalance of the
Wheatstone bridge [6]. The strain gauge load cell is used Fig. 2. Flowchart of LPG leakage detection.
in this proposed system [7], [8]. The output result of pre-
calibrated load cell which is a digital data is displayed by the
16 × 2 LCD Display as well as mobile app named “BLYNK”. In this system, Wi-Fi module is used for communication
LCD is used to display the results after the operation in medium which sends the results and notification of the sit-
the Arduino board. The LCD screen which has been used in uation through mobile app. Node-MCU ESP-8266 is being
this proposed system is 16 × 2 LCD. It is used in the 4- used for this communication purpose [12] and to control the
bit mode and given the task of displaying the output only of solenoid valve which is works as a protection valve for this
temperature-humidity and weight of the cylinder so that user system to prevent the spread of harmful gas. We used the soft-
can notify how much gas is available. ware named “BLYNK” for mobile app, which is a platform
Arduino is an open-source prototyping platform based on with IOS and Android apps to control Arduino, Raspberry Pi
easy-to-use hardware and software. In this system Arduino and similar over the Internet [13], [14]. It’s a digital dashboard
mega 2560 is used where atmega-2560 microcontroller [9] which has a graphical user interface for any project based on
receives the output signal from the MQ-2 gas sensor [10] and IOT by simply dragging and dropping widgets.
sends a signal to mobile app named “BLYNK” through Wi-
Fi module and display the status of current situation on the III. S YSTEM O PERATION
Liquid Crystal Display panel (LCD). Proposed operation can be portrayed as three parts- leakage
Solenoid valve is an electromechanically operated valve, detection system, monitoring system and safety system.
Actuator attached with the valve acts as an electromag-
net. When current passes through the actuator, a magnetic
field build up which energized the actuator and shut down A. Gas Leakage Detection System
the valve. In this system 2-way solenoid valve is used to The flowchart represents the operation of gas leakage
prevent the leakage from spreading all over the environment. detection in the proposed system is shown in Fig. 2.
A temperature-Humidity sensor DHT-22 is also used in this For the purpose of gas leakage detection, the gas sensor
system to detect the condition of the environment where this that is used in this system is MQ-2. The outer membrane
system will be present. A 5v relay is used with this valve of this sensor is made up of SnO2 (Tin Dioxide). As it is
which has a current capacity of 10A. a electro-chemical sensor, so it reacts with the propane and
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Fig. 4. LPG safety system.

Fig. 3. LPG monitoring system.

butane gas and produced output of chemical value is converted

into a corresponding electrical voltage. This electrical voltage
is then sent to the Arduino and after amplification, a notifica-
tion is sent to the 16 × 2 LCD display and displayed to the
mobile app.

B. LPG Monitoring System

The flowchart represents the operation of LPG monitoring
system in the proposed system is shown in Fig. 3.
To monitor the LPG, a strain gauge load cell CZL-601 is
used. This load cell produces an output according to the
change of the resistance inside the load cell [8], which is
rather amplified by an instrumentation amplifier and then sent
to the Arduino. The Arduino processes this information and
corresponding output is converted into ASCII codes which is
displayed on the LCD screen as well as in the mobile app.
C. LPG Safety System
The flowchart represents the operation of LPG safety pro-
cess in the proposed system is shown in Fig. 4.
To prevent the leaked gas from spread out in the surround-
ings a protection valve is used in between the supply line of
the LPG. In this proposed system a solenoid valve is used to
prevent the gas from spreading. It is an electromechanically
operated valve; an actuator is attached with the valve acts as
an electromagnet. It is controlled by the mobile app. When
the shutdown button is pressed from the app, a current pass
through the actuator, a magnetic field build up which energized
Fig. 5. Designed prototype.
the actuator and shut down the valve. That’s how, it provides
a protection againstthe gases spreading out.
IV. R ESULTS A NALYSIS
The prototype of the proposed system was implemented to
prevent the accident occurs by gas leakage as well as monitor
the gas level of LPG cylinder. The prototype and display of
the proposed system are shown in Figs. 5–8.
The prototype system in Fig. 5 exhibits the detection of LPG
leakage when a small amount of LPG is brought near to the
MQ-2 gas sensor, it reacts with its sensible range and sends
output signal to the Arduino and Arduino sends the signal to
the LCD display as well as to the mobile app. It also shows
the carbon-monoxide and smoke level which is detected by
the gas sensor. In Fig. 6, the system prototype also monitors
the gas level of LPG cylinder and displays the weight of the
cylinder on the LCD displays as well as “BLYNK” mobile
app.

Fig. 6. LCD Display.
Fig. 7. Protection valve as a safety system.
On the LCD screen “W=0.00 KG” indicates the amount of
LPG left in the cylinder expressed in terms of KG (kilogram)
which is a SI unit. In this demonstration a water bottle is used
instead of a gas cylinder because it is a miniature device. The
load cell under the bottle which can measure not more than
10kg. It is calibrated successfully so that it is showing the
actual weight of that bottle. It also confirms the amount of LPG
left in the cylinder and it is also shown that, if any leakage
occurs, the solenoid valve(white) will shut down which can
be operated from mobile app in Fig. 7.
In the previous papers related to this, they just developed
a system which can be operated through GSM and that can
only measure how much LPG left on the cylinder [15] with
booking system [16], but our system can not only measure but
also it can take initiative safety for the accidental moment.
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V. C ONCLUSION
The proposed Smart Gas Leakage Detection with
Monitoring and Automatic Safety System is mainly aimed
for household purposes, where the user can be notified of the
amount of LPG remaining in the cylinder so that necessary
actions can be taken to pre-book a new cylinder without any
hassle. Also, the proposed system notifies the user about any
LPG leakage to take preventive action to avoid an explosion
by sending data with the help of Wi-Fi communication system
and with an automatic safety system. The proposed system can
also be used in hospital in case of an LPG leakage and it can
also be used commercial sectors such as shops, hotels etc. This
system can be expanded to the next level by addition of a dual
mode communication system for better performance.
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