A simple metering interface to increase awareness of the solar energy available in relation to daily electricity consumption.

Currently, ITP owns one 80 watt solar panel located on the roof of the Tisch building. Our system logs the amount of solar energy converted to electricity (volts) through a wireless radio system in place on the 12th floor. Solar Time is a physical display which presents current, live readings of the solar energy adjacent to a reading of power consumption locally (specifically the ITP lounge). Our intention is to show what's possible with a single solar panel, and compare that with what we consume on a daily basis. Units will be presented as icons of everyday objects, rather than volts/amps/watts.

PROJECT ELEMENTS:

12th Floor:
- Sharp 80W NE-80EJE Solar Panel [datasheet]
- Sunsaver 10 Controller [datasheet | manual ]
- XBee circuit (see below)
- Xbee + XPort circuit (see below)
- Netgear Switching Adapter DSA-9R-05

Xbee circuit connected to Sunsaver Controller. Requires 3.3VDC (powered directly from solar panel)

Xbee + Xport circuit connects to Netgear Switchlet. Requires 3.3VDC (via 12VDC power adapter here)

4th Floor (initial diagram):
To be updated with gateway script in process by Gilad Lotan & Rob Faludi

INTERFACE CONCEPTUAL SKETCHES:

PAPER PROTOTYPES:

Rough test with Processing accessing PHP script. Value is passed serially to Arduino and activates meter movement every 10 sec.
PLAY VIDEO DEMO (Super grainy a la Nokia N80)

UPDATE 4/10/07:
Resolved Tisch firewall issue and slowed down rate of readings from solar panel XBee over the weekend. Incoming readings to database matched actual multimeter readings. Stabilize and test wiring to panel

ADDITIONAL NOTES :
Test readings against Watts Up Pro: https://www.doubleed.com/secure.html

Circuit Documentation: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pablocomotion/sets/72157594404911232/

Notes on sleeping the XBee radios for power conservation: http://x.pablocomotion.com/blog/?p=160

PREVIOUS RESEARCH / NOTES :
Element of Green Room Proposal for the conference room at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program:

Green Room Overview: http://itp.nyu.edu/sustainability/practices/GreenRoom/GreenRoom

Roof-Link (wireless network for logging data from roof solar panel): http://itp.nyu.edu/sustainability/practices/Roof-Link/Roof-Link