Background
A utility-scale solar power plant can consist of hundreds to thousands of photovoltaic (PV) panels and installations that require continuous operation and monitoring. Besides comparing power output under actual climatic conditions to predicted forecasts, solar power plants also need data to schedule repairs or preventive maintenance.
Case
A utility-scale solar energy operation and management (O&M) company requested a solution to collect and transfer data from remote solar farms over cellular networks to their own private cloud database.
System Requirements
- Industrial-grade edge computer for acquiring and logging inverter data to monitor PV panel performance
- AI/DIO for climatic data monitoring and engine control
- Reliable operation in wide-temperature outdoor environments
- Web-based remote monitoring of solar array performance, battery load, and environmental data from sensors
- Open platform for custom application development
System Architecture
Why Elastel
- Elastel EG500, the RPi CM4 based Edge Gateway with 1.5 GHz processor and up to 8GB RAM
- -25 to 70°C wide operating temperature range with LTE
- Robust 2xGbE and Global 4G LTE/3G/2G/NB-IoT network available
- Web-based data collection and local dashboard software provides Modbus RTU/TCP and MQTT connectivity, cellular network settings.
- Raspberry Pi plentiful software and platforms compatible, and supports C/Python APIs... for customization
Featured Product
EG500 Edge Gateway
Powered by Raspberry Pi CM4. Expanded Serial and I/O ports for industrial needs, GbE, WiFI, Cellular Connectivities options, and ture IPC-grade enclosure
- 2xGbE , 4G LTE/3G/2G/NB-IoT, LoRaWAN/WiFi HaLow optional.
- Industrial-grade DI/DO/AI/CAN-bus (optional)/RS232/RS485.
- Hardware Watchdog, Network Failover, -25 ~ 70°C working