The tracer gas ratio method, using CO2 as natural tracer, has been suggested as a pragmatic option to measure emissions from naturally ventilated (NV) barns without the need to directly estimate the ventilation rate.

The aim of this research was to assess the performance of a low-cost Non-Dispersive Infra-Red (NDIR) sensor for intensive spatial field monitoring of CO2 concentrations in a NV dairy cow house. This was achieved by comparing NDIR gas sensors with two commonly applied methods, a Photo-Acoustic Spectroscope (PAS) Gas Monitor and an Open-Path laser (OP-laser).

First, calibrations for the NDIR gas sensors were obtained in the laboratory. Then, the NDIR sensors were placed in a dairy cow barn for comparison with the PAS and OP-laser methods.

The main conclusions were: (a) in order to represent the overall barn CO2 concentration of the dairy cow barn, the number of NDIR gas sensors to be accounted for average concentration calculation was dependent on barn length and on barn area occupation; and (b) the NDIR CO2 sensors are suitable for multi-point monitoring of CO2 concentrations in NV livestock barns, being a feasible alternative for the PAS and the OP-laser methods to monitor single-point or averaged spatial CO2 concentrations in livestock barns.