Issue link: https://read.uberflip.com/i/1423211
LoRa Alliance ® and LoRaWAN ® are registered trademarks. Used with permission. ©2020 LoRa Alliance ® www.lora-alliance.org WHY LORAWAN ® IS THE LOGICAL CHOICE FOR CROP PRODUCTION MONITORING SOLUTIONS areas where there is no nearb power su pply . t' s ob iou s that ou can' t ru n electrical cab les throu gh a rice paddy or a potato field safely and cost-effectively but more routinely, it' s also impractical to change a attery sev eral times du ring a crop cy cle. heref ore, a solu tion that is easy to deploy of ers a long battery life of at around five years and can be cost- ef ectiv ely integrated into a dev ice is the ideal. his means precision agricu ltu re' s connectiv ity options center on LP WANs which can prov ide the last miles of ex tension to cellular or fixed networks that are necessary for connecting sensor networks ov er large geographies and su pporting dev ices that are ou t of reach of traditional network options. Within the LP WAN category there are sev eral options ranging rom proprietary or regional options, su ch as igf ox and newly -dev eloped cellu lar of erings, su ch as narrowb and-I oT NB -I oT to open standard of erings su ch as LoRaWAN. WHY LoRaWAN? When it comes to precision agricu ltu re, armers' goals or deploy ments are that dev ices are easy to install, simple to operate and do not rely on wires. Also, it' s nderstood that solar power is inef ectiv e ecau se, as plants grow, their leav es ob scu re panels and du st and mu d which are nav oidab le in most ty pes of arming hav e similar ef ects. eploy ments also need to e ab le to eatu re long-term power that is cheaply emb edded in the dev ice. eing ab le to operate or ears sing something as simple as a traditional AA attery is conv enient ecau se ex pensiv e attery technologies are cost-prohib itiv e while solu tions that req ire attery recharging or replacement req ire too much human interaction – this is too expensive and takes p too mu ch time or crop produ cers. inally deploy ment req irements are relativ ely simple. onnections need to e long-distance so dev ices can commu nicate ack to a gateway that may e a ew kilometers away . hey also need only low data rates ecau se of the small antity of data transmitted. LoRaWAN is a great fit, matching all of the above req irements. t is optimiz ed or lower data rates and can transmit data ov er many kilometers. n addition, it is low power and ecau se it relies on niv ersal protocols, the costs of the connectiv ity can e shared across mu ltiple dev ices. or ex ample, LoRaWAN connectiv ity can e shared soil sensors, agricu ltu ral machines, and other applications. en so, there are some challenges associated with LoRaWAN deploy ment that need to e considered and addressed. t' s necessary to pay attention to how the inf rastru ctu re is deploy ed. his req ires the right tools to make su re the inf rastru ctu re works properly once installed, or ex ample, and ex plains why many sers will choose to hav e LoRaWAN inf rastru ctu re installed a serv ice prov ider. ev eral LoRaWAN serv ice prov iders su ch as aige Wireless, N, range, or eniou s propose a nationwide cov erage with the option to ex pand this cov erage with an ex tra gateway that can e installed on the arm. hey ru n a siness model ased on a connection ee per dev ice. ther operators like omcast charge a ee per gateway . nnov ativ e network deploy ment and management approaches, su ch as enet' s Low ower Wide Area irtu al Network LV N™ prov ide ex tensiv e cov erage options in ru ral areas, allowing or a mu ltitu de of agricu ltu re and precision arming applications to e deploy ed today . asy LoRaWAN gateway deploy ment and clou d-b ased network management allow or applications to e implemented at a low cost and rapidly ex panded ased on niq e cu stomer req irements. his modern approach to deploy ing and managing oT connectiv ity cannot e matched traditional cellu lar models or proprietary technologies. USE CASES WEATHER STATIONS Weather knowledge play s the most important role in the planning of the maj ority of agricu ltu ral activ ities and helps armers decide when to seed, when and how mu ch to irrigate, when and how mu ch to spray ertiliz ers and pesticides and whether it is necessary to protect crops rom rost. Providers such as Pessl Instruments and MCF88 provide connected weather stations that record temperatu re, hu midity atmospheric pressu re, rainf all, and wind speed