Rooftop testing station site goes live

John Lawler mentioned our rooftop testing station back in April. We've undertaken a fun project over the last couple of weeks, and I'm pleased to announce our web site that shows data from the instruments in our rooftop solar testing station. You can check it out at http://roof.greenmountainengineering.com/.

Data is recorded whenever the sun is up in San Francisco and is displayed "live" (well, actually updated every 60 seconds) for the current day. If you select a day in the past from the calendar, you'll see data from that day. You'll also get a fancy time-lapse video showing the weather conditions for that day.

Although the setup is explained in much more detail on the actual site, the very short version of how this all works is that we have a computer in a weather-proof case on the roof. The computer collects data from all of the various instruments and sensors (including a Trac-Stat SL1) and sends it off to our web server. Our web server stores that data, processes it, and sends it to you in the form of a web site.

This whole arrangement is a simple analogue for a number of projects we've done for our clients. Although our rooftop testing station site shows off a publicly-accessible, read-only interface to a single set of equipment, we've built secure systems to control and monitor hundreds of discrete pieces of equipment simultaneously, log hundreds of gigabytes of data per year, and provide convenient access to equipment in remote locations.

Please let us know if you have any questions about the site or if you'd like to learn more about the kinds of things we can do to develop monitoring and control systems for you.