Helping E.ON Monitor Cable Cabinets

The German energy company E.ON is one of the leading suppliers of electricity and gas in the Czech Republic and across Europe. It emphasizes reliability and customer focus and ranks among the innovation leaders in the country. We were glad it chose us to help prepare its next innovation - a single project with two requirements: to create a battery-powered temperature and humidity sensor for cable cabinets, and to trial the new NB-IoT communication network.

The Challenge

Cable cabinets are prone to elevated humidity and temperature. Under the wrong climatic conditions, corrosion occurs, knife fuses crack, and maintenance costs rise sharply.

For E.ON, choosing a cabinet supplier whose products are most resistant to the climate is therefore crucial. To compare suppliers, E.ON decided to monitor humidity and temperature inside individual cabinets online, with a sensor that would send reports on temperature and humidity every day for later analysis.

At the same time, E.ON wanted to trial another novelty: the narrowband NB-IoT network that Vodafone had begun to offer. It is a data-only network based on LTE, with very good coverage even underground, designed specifically for smart devices. We already had experience with the new network from the kurovcoveinfo.cz project, where we developed sensors to measure temperature near bark-beetle traps, so meeting E.ON’s needs was straightforward.

The project brought several requirements:

• The device had to communicate over the new NB-IoT network
• The device had to run on batteries for several years, so it could not be power-hungry
• Installation had to be simple, and the device low-maintenance

The Solution

Given the need for increased durability, we chose the robust CHESTER platform from our BLOX system, which works in temperatures from -45 to 70 °C and, thanks to its low power consumption, runs on battery for up to five years.

For the project we used:

• Our outdoor CHESTER IoT platform
• Vodafone’s NB-IoT network
• A GNSS module to determine the sensor’s position
• A Bluetooth chip for easy short-range configuration and device management

For visualizing the collected data we used the open-source Grafana solution. We also supplied E.ON with a smartphone app for updating firmware and managing the sensor.

We developed and manufactured the 40 pilot units within two months of the order. E.ON’s technicians handled the deployment themselves, installing the sensors in cable cabinets across the Czech Republic. The sensors do not interfere with the contents of the cabinet at all.

Results

Thanks to our sensors, E.ON monitors the quality of its cable cabinets online and knows which suppliers it can rely on, saving a significant amount on maintenance.

With this project E.ON also confirmed its position as an innovator, becoming one of the first companies in the Czech Republic to use the new NB-IoT network - which proved very reliable.

“We approached HARDWARIO with the goal of testing the NB-IoT network. In a short time we designed a solution for monitoring climatic conditions in cable cabinets, and within two months we had our own device in hand. We look forward to further joint projects.”

Dominik Harman, Project Manager, E.ON