Solar/Wind Powered Instrumentation Module Development for Polar Environmental Research

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This award provides support for the development and testing of a self-contained, transportable module that will provide a sheltered, temperature-controlled interior environment for standard, rack-mounted equipment. Electric power will be provided by solar panels and a wind generator, backed up by batteries of several days' capacity. The module will offer both AC and DC power for internal and external use, and will include datalogging and communications capability for practical application in a polar environment. At the South Pole Station, McMurdo Station, and almost all other inhabited camps in Antarctica, exhaust is released from aircraft, helicopters, ground vehicles, diesel generators and other sources, all of which have a potential impact on the environment. The collection of real-time pollution data at downwind locations can be used to assess the amount of pollution and the effectiveness of efforts to improve air quality. At the current time, optimal placement of the measuring instruments is severely limited by the availability of power and shelter, a limitation that the module is intended to overcome. Although designed to facilitate measurements at the South Pole, the module will be of use in a variety of other situations where remotely located equipment is to be used for long-term monitoring of environmental phenomena. The module will have zero emissions, thereby not affecting the environment that it is designed to study: and it could be placed at any location as called for by the research need.