New Waspmote Smart Metering sensor board enables the measurement of key parameters in electricity and water supplies

ZARAGOZA, SPAIN, October 23, 2010 (Press-News.org) Libelium, a technology leader in wireless sensor networks, announces a new Smart Metering Sensor board for its award winning Waspmote platform. The new board extends the current features by supporting the measurement of the following key parameters: electric current, water flow, weight of materials and goods, liquid level, distance and displacement of an object. Applications include managing the usage of electricity & water, supply chain management and manufacturing.

The European Union sees the widespread introduction of smart metering as vital in the reduction of energy costs and carbon emissions. The 2009 Electricity Directive will ensure that every household in the EU will be fitted with smart meters by 2022. Smart meters allow energy usage to be precisely monitored and controlled in real time and are equally important for domestic and industrial customers.

Most existing smart metering products are closed systems with limited wireless range making them unsuitable for most industrial uses. David Gascón says, "Combining the new sensor board with Waspmote's wide range of radios, enables monitoring of electricity and water usage in the most remote locations". A wide choice of ZigBee radio modules is available including, for long range purposes, 868 MHz (for Europe) and 900 MHz (for US). He adds, "Waspmote enables measurement to take place wherever required, for example from garages, basements, remote machinery and even from inside walls".

Industrial systems need to be configurable and very reliable. The modular, open platform is readily configurable to meet the specific needs of a customer. Users only need to buy those boards and sensors that they require for their particular application. Many existing smart meters depend on a mains power supply meaning that if that fails, the meter powers down and is therefore unable to send an alarm. David adds, "With a battery power supply and extremely low current usage, Waspmote is reliably able to alert users". The Waspmote electrical current sensor is suitable for domestic and industrial use covering up to 150 A.

The water flow sensor - capable of measuring flows in pipes from 0.15 to 60 litres/minute - is suitable for measuring water consumption, for detecting leakage in pipes and for monitoring agricultural irrigation.

The term 'smart metering' often refers to monitoring the supply of electricity and water; however, it is a much broader technical challenge. Highly reliable smart metering can not only be used for managing utility supplies but also brings benefits to managing liquid storage, inventories such as grain in silos and movement of goods.

For these other applications, the new board can be combined with a rich choice of sensors. Examples of uses include: weighing goods during manufacturing with the load cell sensor; checking liquid levels in a tank with the level sensor; measuring distances to objects with an ultrasound sensor; and measuring object movement with the displacement foil sensor.

Waspmote's modularity and openness enables Smart Metering to be deployed flexibly by customers. The new versatile board, which is ideal for smaller and medium scale deployments, supports up to six sensors; the customer can select the type and number of sensors to use. For larger scale deployment, Libelium offers a development service to create custom metering boards with one or two sensors.

Earlier this month Wireless Sensing Interest Group (WiSIG) gave the Best Demo Award to Libelium at the Sensing Technology 2010 Exhibition (Birmingham, UK) for the work performed with the Waspmote platform. Waspmote was also chosen by Sensors Magazine as one of the most exciting new products at the Sensors Expo & Conference in Rosemont, Illinois in June 2010.

About Wireless Sensor Networks
Wireless sensor networks (WSN) consist of small battery powered electronic devices - often known as "motes" - which gather data from built-in sensors. A WSN is self-organising allowing it to have high availability, scalability and simple installation. Applications include environmental monitoring, fire or gas detection, smart metering, farming, logistics and security.

For more information visit http://www.libelium.com/products/waspmote/wsn

About Waspmote
Waspmote is a modular platform for building wireless sensor networks. The platform comprises:
the Waspmote board with microcontroller, memory, battery, accelerometer and sockets for add-on modules; open source API and compiler; Xbee range of ZigBee wireless communication modules offer a choice of protocol versions, radio frequency and range (up to 40 km); wireless modules supporting Bluetooth, GPRS, GPS; and a wide variety of sensor boards enabling the measurement of gases, physical events, agricultural & smart metering parameters; and outstanding power management - an unprecedented 0.7 microamperes is required in hibernate mode.
Waspmote is CE, FCC and IC certified.

For Waspmote platform details visit http://www.libelium.com/waspmote


About Libelium
Libelium designs and manufactures hardware and communication protocols for distributed wireless networks. The product portfolio consists of the Waspmote low power platform for creating wireless sensor networks; the Meshlium multi-tech router integrating WiFi mesh (2.4GHz - 5GHz), ZigBee, GPRS, GPS and Bluetooth technologies

The company was founded in 2006, is privately held and is based at the European Business and Innovation Centre CEEIARAGON, Zaragoza, Spain.

For more information call +34 976 54 74 92 or visit http://www.libelium.com


Press Contact
David Gascón
CTO Libelium
Tel: +34 976 54 74 92
e-mail: d.gascon[at]libelium[dot]com

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