Birds’ fight against ultrasonic wind sensors

Bird sitting on an ultrasonic anemometer.[1]

Ultrasound and wildlife reserves

Ultrasonic anemometers seemed like the solution for maintenance-free wind measurement, yet nature had its say. Their ultrasound, while being inaudible to humans, is disturbing enough to natural wild life so that each year, birds destroy about 1/3 of all ultrasonic sensors by biting out their ultrasonic transducers as reported by the German Met Office. [1] This leads to the question of whether ultrasonic sensors are environmentally friendly and whether they should be allowed in wildlife reserves and national parks or if their application should be limited to industrial use?

Bird damage to an ultrasonic anemometer transducer [1]

Cup anemometer renaissance

New advances in electronics and manufacturing are enabling mechanical cup anemometers to not only outlast their ultrasonic counterparts but to maintain their accuracy advantage and to remain the mainstay of meteorological measurement and of the precision wind energy industry.

References:

[1] Examination of different versions of bird repelling techniques for ultrasonic anemometers by K. Schubotz, H. Dörschel, Dr. E. Lanzinger, M. Theel of the German Meteorological Service.

Strategic partnership of BARANI DESIGN Technologies and Comptus Inc. of USA

BARANI DESIGN Technologies and Comptus Inc. of USA strategic partnership announced.

BARANI DESIGN Technologies of Slovakia will create a strategic partnership with Comptus Inc. of USA, who is one of the only two producers of the most widely used anemometer for wind energy applications worldwide. The immediate benefits of this partnership will include:

• MeteoShield® Professional will be soon available in a Made-in-USA version

• MeteoHelix® IoT Pro micro weather stations will soon be available in Assembled-in-USA LoRaWAN and Sigfox version with NB-IoT to follow

• Comptus Inc. will become a USA & worldwide distributor and integrator of BARANI DESIGN anemometers, weather stations and sensors

• BARANI DESIGN will become a worldwide distributor of the A75-101 & A75-104 anemometer and A75-302 wind direction vane, the direct equivalents of the well known NRG #40 anemometer and NRG #200 wind vane. These products were also sold through Second Wind and Vaisala as the C3 anemometer and PV1 wind vane

In a technology sharing program, both companies will join forces to develop a low-cost wireless precision wind measurement solution to complement the MeteoHelix® IoT Pro wireless weather stations and to directly compete in the high-end and middle market segments in agricultural weather station applications. The MeteoHelix® and MeteoWind® Compact combination will become the only affordably priced weather station solution to meet the Wold Meteorological Organization (WMO) measurement standards. This meteorological sensor solution is aimed at putting precision back into precision agriculture which is currently being dominated by measurement equipment not conforming to worldwide measurement standards.