Learning from our past experiences in providing emergency communications assistance, Smart is now supporting efforts aimed at increasing community disaster preparedness in hazard-prone areas.

Aside from donating warning bells from recycled acetylene tanks called batingaw as well as radio equipment and information leaflets for the community-based early warning system in selected municipalities in the country, Smart is currently working with Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS) and Smart Wireless Engineering Education Program (SWEEP) partner schools to develop remote monitoring systems for the agency.

Objectives

1. Aid the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS) in creating or improving disaster monitoring systems in four areas of concern:
   - volcano monitoring
   - tsunami detection
   - seismic data transmission
   - meteorological monitoring (rain gauge data assessment)
   
2. Increase prospects for community engagement in disaster monitoring by involving SWEEP partner schools through research and development
   
3. Create linkages and partnerships with the academe, Office of Civil Defense (OCD), National Disaster Coordinating Council and Phivolcs

To deal with future disasters, Smart intends to link up this wide network of SWEEP schools with PHIVOLCS to research on low-cost remote monitoring systems that can be used for volcano monitoring, tsunami detection, seismic data transmission and meteorological monitoring. From this, the company hopes to create a vast network of monitoring stations across the country via SWEEP and help out in the disaster preparedness and response program of the country..

Machine to Machine (M2M) systems as well as wireless broadband applications are being proposed as immediate fields of study for the engineering students and faculty involved in this collaborative project.

SWEEP schools may deploy monitoring equipment in PHIVOLCS manned/unmanned stations that will be equipped with M2M hardware which will use low-cost sensor interfaces to create physical connections to and gather real-time data. A cheap connectivity terminal alternative can then deliver the data either through GSM (Global System for Mobile, HSCSD (High Speed Circuit Switched Data) or GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) or 3G (if applicable) to the PHIVOLCS central database.