Lufft USA declared the start of production of a new incorporated weather station, which has an in-built feature of measuring solar radiation. By adding the Kipp & Zonen CMP Pyranometer to the weather station, solar radiation can be measured along with the other parameters (temperature, relative humidity, air pressure and wind speed and direction) that are already being measured.
WS501 UMB compact weather station with solar pyranometer
Lufft USA unveils the new weather station at the American Meteorological Society Exposition, which was held recently at Seattle, Washington, USA. The new weather stations, namely WS301 and WS501, are additions to the Lufft line of contemporary weather stations that are driven by an intelligent microprocessor. The sensors are created with cost-effectiveness in mind and therefore multiple climate sensors are integrated into a single adaptable sensor. Both the WS501 and WS301 are capable of measuring global irradiance; individually WS501 can measure wind, temperature, humidity and air pressure and WS301 temperature, humidity and air pressure.
The weather parameters are measured with accuracy and are attuned to international standards of quality ISO17025/9001. The measurement data is transmitted using the RS485/RS232 digital stream or through analog channels using additional hardware. The compact weather stations can be programmed using the ASCII language, SDI-12, UMB, NMEA automatic telegram or analog. There are other models like WS200 to WS600 and VENTUS/V200A ultrasonic anemometer models that differ in their functionality and can be used for particular weather monitoring applications. The WS600 being the top-range amongst the models, measures temperature, humidity, precipitation, air pressure, wind direction and wind speed. The VENTUS model is best suited for wind turbine applications because it can survive cold weather climates by using the 240W heater.
Lufft chose the CMP 3 for adding to the weather station because in addition to the low cost it had the required functionality for measuring solar radiation. The Lufft WS sensors can be used with any model of the Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) that uses MODBUS for communicating the data.