Remote housekeeping at the press of some buttons

Mawson station, midwinter: there’s less than one hour of sunlight each day, winds are blowing to 200km/h and temperatures dropping to minus 30°C. Of the 17 expeditioners working in this isolated place, only six are tradespeople responsible for maintaining the network of large, hi-tech buildings. But they are not alone. 5000km away, engineers monitor and control the buildings.

A building monitoring and control system (BMCS) has been installed at Mawson, Davis and Casey to improve energy efficiency (see Reducing energy use in Australian Antarctic Magazine #1). Among other benefits, the BMCS brings:

  • reduced energy consumption
  • less fossil fuels
  • increased comfort and safety

Across the three stations, the BMCS utilises 120 controllers to monitor over 3500 sensors and switches and control almost 500 pumps, fans, valves and actuators. Room temperatures, pump speeds and ventilation systems at the stations are fully controllable both on station and from Australian Antarctic Division’s headquarters in Hobart, Tasmania using the AAD’s wide area network.

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