"Intrinsic safety" emphasizes the inherent safety of a system. The safer the system is intrinsically, the lower the probability of accidents. Due to its significant importance and role, intrinsic safety is increasingly valued across all industries nationwide.

Currently, with the aging of some gas pipelines in China and the increase in gas users year by year, the rate of gas accidents has also risen annually. Starting in April this year, a nationwide major safety production inspection was implemented, with hidden dangers particularly prominent in the gas sector.

Since 2004, Qiaosong Artificial Intelligence Safety Gas Meters (hereinafter referred to as "Qiaosong Gas Meters") have entered thousands of households, with over 4 million units now installed and networked. Relying on intrinsic safety technology, they have enabled household gas safety management systems in some regions to require no additional safety measures, achieving zero accidents and earning recognition as a benchmark in the gas safety field.

Constructing Intrinsic Safety in Gas Safety Management Systems

Qiaosong Gas Meters are one of the achievements of intrinsic safety technology. By selecting reliable methods, they eliminate or control hazard sources from the root, requiring no additional safety protection measures or management measures, achieving intrinsic safety through technology and assisting local gas safety management, making household gas safety management effortless.

In 2004, Chongqing Qiaosong Information Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter "Qiaosong Company") was established. In 2006, it successfully pioneered intelligent gas meters and received unconditional funding from the national innovation fund that year for its artificial intelligence gas safety technology. Since the launch of the first-generation intelligent gas meter, the company has consistently focused on iterative upgrades in product functions, quality, lifespan, and other characteristics, continuously incorporating new materials, new processes, and innovative chip designs and algorithms, maintaining a leading technical strength. The principle of Qiaosong Gas Meters is based on "gas use never leaves the person; when the person leaves, the valve closes." They automatically collect data on gas usage behavior, usage status, leakage characteristics, etc., through real-time acquisition of gas state data flowing through the meter. Particularly in the technology of perceiving danger and actively shutting off gas, it is a domestic first in China, capable of automatically determining whether pipelines or valves downstream of the meter are leaking. Whether minor leaks or large-flow leaks, unattended fires, or fainting during cooking, as long as there is an anomaly, it will actively shut off the gas to ensure no accidents occur, and promptly notify relevant personnel via the network, eliminating unsafe gas factors from the source.

Although a mature technical system was formed early on, Qiaosong Intelligent Gas Meters still comply with China's revised "Production Safety Law" in 2021 and the "Gas Engineering Project Specifications" implemented in 2022 regarding gas leakage alarm and cutoff standards.

According to reports, Qiaosong Intelligent Gas Meters have the following advantages:

First, abnormal installation cannot operate. Every installed meter is incorporated into Qiaosong Company's gas intelligent management platform for unified management, automatically including the six links of installation, safety inspection, repair, maintenance, and scrapping in the safety management system.

Second, usage status is clear. The established unified platform can clearly know the gas safety status of the area controlled by each meter, guide enterprise safety management decisions, automatically constrain safety hazards, and eliminate them promptly.

Third, strong fault tolerance, achieving integration of enterprise informatization and industrialization. Online quality detection technology avoids quality defects caused by human factors; online automatic repair avoids lifespan shortening due to component failure; multi-monitoring technology ensures safety monitoring coexists with gas use until decommissioning. These fault-tolerant technologies enable an 8-year free warranty, maximizing gas safety assurance.

Fourth, easy to control. Once unsafe hazards trigger the safety disposal process, closed-loop control ensures hazard elimination. Taking Zitong County in Sichuan as an example, through the county's terminal, it is clear that there are an average of 2 to 3 active gas shutoffs per day, making it easy for staff to know where to eliminate risks.

Fifth, simple operation, easy to use and understand. Qiaosong Gas Meters have only one key and one light; users can operate and understand safety status without learning, with complex controls automatically handled by the intelligent management platform, avoiding unsafe factors from misoperations. The Qiaosong Gas Intelligent Management Platform was rated as one of Chongqing's Top 10 IoT Technologies in 2018 and one of the Top 10 Achievements in Deep Integration of Artificial Intelligence and the Real Economy in Chongqing, featuring simple software that is easy to use and understand, facilitating online management.

No Additional Safety Protection Measures Achieve "Intrinsic Safety" System

Japan's established household gas safety management system has intrinsic safety without needing additional safety measures, achieving an "intrinsic safety" system, resulting in the fewest gas safety accidents worldwide. In China, household gas safety management systems formed in some places using Qiaosong Gas Meters also have intrinsic safety without needing additional safety measures, achieving China's "intrinsic safety" system.

According to relevant officials from Qiaosong Company, not adding safety measures reduces links and avoids unsafe factors such as improper installation, damaged connectors, or aging in those links. Without additional safety devices, there is no need for gas concentration alarms or self-closing valves.

The principle of gas concentration alarms is sampling combustion, where combustion temperature corresponds to concentration, often causing false alarms due to heavy oil smoke, leading to "misjudgments" by the alarm. Gas leakage is a diffusion process, inevitably creating an explosive limit range (5%~15%) of air-gas mixture in the leakage space. When 5%~15% air-gas mixture diffuses to the alarm probe and activates heating detection, it may ignite the gas, causing an accident—the alarm instead becomes an unsafe factor. Self-closing valves are mainly used to close the gas path in cases of pipeline detachment or major damage causing large-flow leakage, requiring threaded metal bellows or hose clamps with embedded steel mesh (i.e., connections that won't detach), which objectively conflict. Using a self-closing valve eliminates the need for bellows, and using bellows eliminates the need for a self-closing valve. Additionally, it only closes under underpressure or overpressure. Frequent gas volume adjustments in kitchen use lead to many underpressure situations, causing misclosures. Moreover, due to uncertain user gas usage time and volume, pipeline pressure fluctuates, and pipeline leaks are not limited to underpressure or overpressure states, posing unsafe factors where leaks occur without valve closure; later maintenance is very difficult, making gas concentration alarm technology and mechanical self-closing valve facilities even more unsafe factors.

"Qiaosong Intelligent Gas Meters, since they do not require additional safety devices, reduce unsafe factors brought by gas concentration alarms and self-closing valves," introduced relevant officials from Qiaosong Company.

"Intrinsic Safety" System Helps Achieve Zero Accidents

Through long-term practice, by applying Qiaosong Gas Meters without additional safety measures, local household gas safety management "intrinsic safety" systems have continuously enabled some places, enterprises, and citizens to reach a consensus of "those who benefit pay," willing to support reasonable cost sharing for added safety functions, allowing gas meter users to maintain rapid growth on the basis of over 4 million households.

By focusing on intrinsic safety technology, Qiaosong Company has promoted zero-accident goals in some areas of Chongqing, Sichuan, Hebei, Tianjin, and other provinces and cities. The benefits go far beyond this: for localities, previously Qiaosong Gas Meters had direct production capacity of only 1 million units/year; later, adopting an authorization model localized production to markets, through flexible production systems and online quality control technology, customizing personalized products suited to local needs according to specific requirements of local gas enterprises, minimizing production and sales costs, achieving closed-loop management of market, production, and taxation in localities, with authorized capacity breaking through 4 million units/year.

For enterprises, integration of gas safety devices and gas meters eliminates unnecessary installation, management, and maintenance costs; from meter hanging, every meter is incorporated into the gas intelligent management platform, enabling online monitoring of the entire gas management process, automatic pipeline airtightness detection, automatic activation of safety monitoring mechanisms, etc., with immediate manual hazard elimination upon anomalies, making enterprise management more efficient, worry-free, and cost-saving.

For users, one meter is sufficient, without self-closing valves, alarms, or cutoff valves, saving money while being safer. No additional costs for metering and safety calibration within 10 years, worry-free throughout use.

Currently entering the high-incidence period for winter gas accidents, facing challenges from gas safety, Qiaosong Company stated that through local household gas safety management "intrinsic safety" systems formed by applying Qiaosong Gas Meters, it will assist more users in achieving "zero accident" goals, and realize zero accidents through household "intrinsic safety" systems.