DENWPMOS

Deploy New Weather/Plant Monitor Sensor

9 January 2018 - 31 December 2018

Lead Scientist: Sebastien Biraud

Observatory: SGP (Southern Great Plains)

Arable Labs Inc., is producing a new type of cheap integrated met sensor (cost $500). This new sensor called Pulsepod, houses technology for gathering more 40 datastreams that are related to plant growth, soil and weather conditions. This sensor will be deployed at the DOE/ARM/SGP central facility, near the AmeriFlux tower, for assessment. The device has three main types of sensor. 1. An acoustic disdrometer, measuring rainfall by noting the size and number of drops that fall on the face of the Pulsepod. 2. A net radiometer to determine how much sunlight the plants around it are receiving. It achieves this by measuring shortwave radiation coming directly from the sun and long wave radiation, which is sunlight that has been reflected back by the plants. Monitoring both allows for calculating how much energy the plants are getting from the sun. 3. A spectrometer, which is used to monitor how well the plants are actually growing. It determines this by measuring narrowband reflectance of sunlight and allows for determining growth of crops, water use and the amount of chlorophyll in the plants. All of the data from the Pulsepod is sent to the cloud via Wi-Fi, cellular. Users can access the data and reports created by Arable via Internet.