TAS Sensor Web: Vaisala WXT520 weather station

Brief description

The Vaisala Weather Transmitter WXT520 is an integrated weather station that measures many phenomena. The Vaisala Weather Transmitter WXT520 measures barometric pressure, humidity, precipitation, temperature, wind speed and wind direction. Full details can be found in the instrument specification available from Vaisala, including measurement ranges and accuracy ranges. The WXT520 precipitation measurement detects the impact of individual rain drops. The WXT520 measures accumulated rainfall, rain intensity and duration of the rain. Rainfall rate is accumulated until data is logged every 15 minutes, and then reset to zero. Rainfall today is cumulative - data is sent every fifteen minutes. Rainfall today should be reset to zero every day but due to an initial configuration error, rainfall today is reset when it reaches an arbitrary limit. [For the Ben Lomond site only. The precipitation measurement device installed at the Ben Lomond site also includes an integrated heating element.] Solar data is collected using a Middleton SK08-E. The SK08 exceeds the ISO9060 specifications for a First Class Pyranometer, and the equivalent WMO specifications for a Good Quality Pyranometer. Full details can be found in the instrument specification available from Middleton. The data collected by these instruments is transmitted by Datacall Gateway loggers over the 3G mobile network, to Powercom’s Datacall Server. The logger is powered by solar panels and a rechargeable battery. The voltage of the battery is also available as a time-series. The data is subsequently retrieved via the Datacall Server using the SOAP protocol and stored in a Postgres PostGIS database where it is made publicly available using a Sensor Observation Service that was created by 52 Degrees North. Recalibration of the instruments has not yet been performed. Currently there is no automated Quality Assurance/Quality Correction process in place.

Delivery method

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