Climate under control
Issue 01-2016:
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The world’s largest research centre for advanced plant genetics, the Beaver Creek Campus by Pioneer Hi-Bred International, located in Johnston/Iowa, provides continuous supervision and control of constant climate conditions for refrigeration racks containing cricitcal material, using the wireless EasySens® solution by Thermokon.
More than 1,000 scientists employed by Pioneer Hi-Bred International, a DuPont group company, work on increasing productivity and profitability of agricultural farms around the globe. Food safety, nutrition, agriculture and energy saving is the primary focus for the scientists.
Individual temperature monitoring
In order to develop innovative and highyielding corn, scientists require controlled working conditions, especially when it comes to temperature and humidity control in testing facilities and refrigeration racks, where sensitive materials are stored. The freezers hold critical experimental material that requires to be monitored constantly.
In case of unexpected temperature deviations or communication loss, a quick intervention is essential to prevent scientific material from damage or fatal loss. If temperature increases rapidly, an alarm signal is triggered to generate preventive action by the employee. A direct and quick identification of a deviating temperature measurement in one of the testing facilities is ensured by using a unique BACnet ID to track the sensor.
The refrigeration racks contain highly sensitive material for food research.
Wireless sensors control the temperature and alert discrepancies immediately. Thus, the staff can react promptly.
Wireless, reliable and compatible
For supervision and monitoring of climate conditions, Pioneer decided to use products
of the EasySens® range by Thermokon. Through wireless integration of EasySens® transmitters into centralized receivers connected to the BMS, transmitters can be mounted directly “on the spot” that allows for a flexible positioning of freezers in open laboratory space. Also future relocations of laboratories do not challenge the BMS setup. Project Manager Bret Petersen says: “Besides the high flexibility that EasySens® offered already, three more criteria were important for us: wireless reliability, integration into our existing Niagara AX infrastructure and supervision of critical material in the laboratories.”
In order to fulfill these requirements, the laboratory space has been divided into four wireless zones to ensure a reliable communication. For an individual analysis of temperature and humidity of the freezers, following products of the EasySens® product family were used:
- SR65-BACnet-315MHz: Wireless EnOcean to BACnet gateway for a reliable forwarding of EnOcean telegrams/alarms in outdoor areas and challenging environments such as refrigeration, greenhouses, production facilities and warehouses. Compatible for integration into existing EnOcean and BUS networks. Unique IDs to identify malfunctions in the freezers immediately.
- SR-65-DI-315MHz: Wireless sensor for transmitting binary inputs via EnOcean wireless telegrams to assigned control devices for triggering alarms or switching relays to initiate an action.
- SRE-Repeater-Ext-315MHz: Repeater for wireless EnOcean telegrams ensuring a proper communication between senders and receivers where needed.
End-to-end monitoring 24/7
The integration of the wireless EnOcean infrastructure was completed within a week. The result: thanks to reliable and flexible wireless EnOcean sensors by Thermokon, Pioneer Hi-Bred International is now able to receive detailed information on each freezer and a quick and easy localization of faulty ones containing critical material. The possibility of future retrofits using additional EnOcean wireless sensors is supported by having the sophisticated Niagara AX software architecture in place.
Cost-savings
Project Manager Bret Petersen is fully satisfied with his decision: “I can recommend the EasySens® system without any limitations. Especially the quick and easy integration of the system needs to be emphasized here. It provides high flexibility and associated cost savings, even in the future. Integrating into the existing Niagara AX infrastructure did not pose a challenge for us at all. Meanwhile, we decided to retrofit and adopt the EasySens® system to another 100 freezers due to its simplicity. Thanks to the adoption and appreciation of the system from our technical guys, we are certain to include additional sensors from the EasySens® product family in future.“
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