SubscribeFire watch towers in Brandenburg, Germany, are being equipped with the innovative fuel cells of SFC, the world’s leading manufacturer of fuel cells for mobile use.
In this project the SFC A50 fuel cell is integrated into a 220 Wp PV system to ensure that the cameras, which in sunny weather are being operated by a solar cell, will also work reliably in bad weather or in winter.
The Automatic Early Warning System for Forest Fires "Firewatch" has been developed by IQ wireless GmbH, Berlin, Germany. In it, a camera installed on a fire watch tower rotates once every eight minutes, thereby continuously recording a 360° panorama of the surrounding forests.
When the system's innovative image processing software - a DLR (German Aerospace - Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V.) development - identifies a trail of smoke, the smoke's bearing and distance are immediately transmitted to the wood fire control station.
The station is then able tom analyze the situation visually. The adoption of "Firewatch" has led to considerable cost savings, as the system takes over surveillance tasks which in the past had to be performed by the rangers - sometimes in extremely hot temperatures - thus freeing the rangers for their actual forestry tasks. „
Brandenburg is one of the areas with the highest fire danger ratings in Europe.
Since the installation of our early fire detection system, the number of fires obviously has not gone down, but the damage caused by those fires has been considerably reduced, thanks to the early detection", says Holger Vogel, Vice President of IQ wireless GmbH.
As several of the fire watch towers, due to their location, have to rely on off-grid power supplies, IQ wireless uses a PV remote system combined with fuel cells to ensure 100% availability of the early detection system in any weather.
„This project with IQ wireless clearly demonstrates the big potential of SFC A50 fuel cells in PV powered projects, where 100 percent power availability is of utmost importance.
There is no such thing as bad weather for a fuel cell - it will always jump in reliably whenever the solar system will not provide enough power due to a lack of solar radiation", says Michael Gruber, Area Manager Industrial Applications at SFC. „
One tower is already operating to fullest satisfaction with the fuel cell/PV combination system, three more will take up operation in fall", says Mr. Vogel. IQ wireless' "Firewatch" system operates at 24 V with a peak power demand of 120 W, which in the course of further developments will be reduced to half of that.
Brunnthal, August 04, 2005 - Since June 2005
