Development of miniaturised sensors for methane detection at trace levels for environmental monitoring applications

Methane (CH₄) is the second most important greenhouse gas in the Earth's atmosphere. Anthropic emissions of CH₄ mainly come from the agricultural and energy sectors. The monitoring of CH₄ low-level emissions is fundamental to detect possible CH₄ leakages from industrial/energy plants, or from natural sources. The development and metrological characterisation of innovative sensors for detecting trace levels of CH₄ is challenging and promising. At INRiM a research activity on miniaturised sensors for CH₄ is ongoing, with support of Piemonte Orientale University “A. Avogadro” (UPO). The plasmonic amplification of the absorbance spectrum of CH₄ (surface-enhanced infra-red absorption - SEIRA) in the proximity of metallic microstructured components is exploited and different SEIRA platforms are under characterisation by means of Fourier transform infra-red spectroscopy. The experimental setup and some preliminary results concerning the development of gas-trapping porous organic frameworks are presented in this work.