What are achievable record intervals in various conditions?
This is highly-dependent on following factors:
- Species behavior: if it's well exposed to sunlight or moderately, or poorly
- Length of the day: in many areas of the world, days are significantly longer in summer than in winter. This also changes the solar charging performance.
- Weather: mainly if Sun is shining directly on the panels, or mostly through clouds
So, as you can see, this question cannot be answered precisely upfront, as the answer depends on details that are unique to given project. So, the only way to really know the answer, is to deploy devices in your project. However, basing on
deployments of multiple customers, we summarized the realistic record intervals achievable in various conditions below. Make sure to read the additional remarks below the table.
| Solar charging conditions | Example sustainable record interval with RadioTag-14 | Example sustainable record interval with NanoRadioTag-3 | Example sustainable record interval with customized device |
|---|
| Good | 1 GPS record per 1 minute continuously; or
daily: up to 2-3 hours of 1 GPS record per 1 second + 1 record per 15 minutes for rest of the time | 1 GPS record per 20 minutes continuously; or
daily: up to 1 hour of 1 GPS record per 1 second + 1 record per 90 minutes for rest of the time | Depends on solar panel and battery size |
| Moderate | 1 GPS record per 15 minutes | 1 GPS record per 2 hours | Depends on solar panel and battery size |
| Poor | 1 GPS record per 2 hours | 1 GPS record per 4-6 hours | Depends on solar panel and battery size |
Additional remarks to this table:
- The "good" conditions are achieved in around 60% of projects. They mean that given species is well exposed to sunlight, days are long and exposure to sunlight is mostly direct (and not through clouds). Some customers have even better conditions (that perhaps should be labeled as "Excellent") and achieve even more frequent data collection, however we have not put them into the table, as these are indeed really good conditions that cannot be expected everywhere (e.g. polar day in high arctic, when there is almost no night).
- It is possible to significantly increase data collection capabilities, if your project allows bigger weight of devices than standard weight of RadioTag-14 (10g) and NanoRadioTag-3(3.5g). Every 5 gram of acceptable additional weight means significant increase to data collection capabilities (as we can use bigger battery and/or bigger solar panels). So if you need higher frequencies of record registration than in standard devices, it's still possible with customized options, however usually it will mean that weight of loggers has to be increased.