Scatol8® is a system to remote-sensing environmental, landscaping and managerial variables, developed by the Department of Commodity Science of the University of Turin, which having a huge experience in research concerning integrated management systems, is developing and testing a remote sensing network system in order to measure environmental and management variables.
The system is based on technology Open Source, at low cost and ease to use: the choice of the name Scatol8® conveys the idea of a friendly, craft made device, easy to understand and to use, therefore accessible.
Scatol8® consists of a central unit and peripheral units, connected in a network. Several sensors, able to detect the monitored variables, are connected to the peripheral units which transmit the data to a central unit. The acquired data are transmitted to a PC on which they are stored, processed and displayed. Thus you can create a real-time monitoring of all greatness detected, and evaluate their trend over time by time series.
The PC itself is able to converge its own data on the Internet and organize them in a collective database.
The variables measured at the moment, concerning the natural context are:
- air temperature
- relative humidity
- wind intensity and direction
- solar irradiation
- air quality
- water quality
- rain precipitation
- snow precipitation
Furthermore, as that system has been developed in order to assess the environmental impact of human activities and presence (focusing, at the moment, on mountain huts and buildings), some other variables are measured, such as:
- electrical consumption
- waste production
- water consumption
- presence
- environmental filming
One of the key lines of the Scatol8® is modularity, which is constituted according to the requirements of each application.
Scatol8® has been developed having a high regard for some consideration concerning sustainability aspects. This results in:
- preference and adoption of open source codes,
- preference and adoption of low cost technologies (taking into account the need of resistance to the specific climate conditions of mountains),
- use of recycled materials. Thanks to that choice, the system is likely to be further developed and improved (i.e. increasing the number of the indicators or the precision of some measurements) with a very least cost impact.
For further information read R. BELTRAMO, The SCATOL8™: an innovation for shifting from Environmental and Landscape Management System (ELMS) to the Eco-Land-Web-Scape Management System (ELWSMS), Romanian Distribution Committee Magazine, Volume 2, Issue 2, 2010, pp. 16-23