Italian security systems integrator Campus has selected a March Networks video surveillance solution for 50 solar farms in sunny southern Italy.
Typically located in isolated rural areas, the sites are prime targets for thieves hoping to make some easy money from the sale of solar panels and copper scrap. Unlike cattle rustlers of times past, these modern day thieves are armed with flashlights and wrenches. They show up at two or three o'clock in the morning disassemble as many panels as they can carry off and disappear into the night.
Italian security systems integrator Campus has selected a March Networks video surveillance solution for 50 solar farms in sunny southern Italy.
Typically located in isolated rural areas, the sites are prime targets for thieves hoping to make some easy money from the sale of solar panels and copper scrap. Unlike cattle rustlers of times past, these modern day thieves are armed with flashlights and wrenches. They show up at two or three o'clock in the morning disassemble as many panels as they can carry off and disappear into the night.
With solar energy production in Italy on the rise, Campus saw a need for a security system capable of addressing the risks faced by the major national and international renewable energy producers attracted to Italy by the country's generous feed-in tariffs.
The hybrid solution selected by Campus includes a mix of analog and IP cameras, March Networks Edge 4 encoders and Video Management System software running on industry standard servers. Video is transmitted to monitoring stations on alarms triggered by March Networks' video analytics software, alerting security staff hundreds of kilometres away to potential intruders.
The use of ADSL connectivity via satellite posed a major challenge. Faced with typical upload bandwidths of 256 kb/s and expensive tariff plans, the systems integrator required industry-eading compression algorithms and event-driven video transmission. The March Networks network domes and encoders featuring both H.264 and MPEG-4 video compression provided Campus with the required bandwidth economies, while March Networks' intrusion detection video analytics kept live video streaming to a minimum. “When alerts are confirmed by recorded images or when there is real-time evidence, monitoring staff are able to react quickly,” said Paolo Matarrese, a Campus sales representative.
“We saw the need for a security system capable of addressing the vulnerability of solar farms and offered our 40 years of experience to the sector,” he added. “We researched the best technologies available on the market and that led us to our partnership with March Networks.”
Italy ranks as the second largest solar market in the world and is aiming for an installed capacity of 8,000 megawatts by 2020. The 50 solar farms currently equipped with March Networks video surveillance systems range in size from 1 MW to 10 MW.
March Networks SiteManager software and decode stations are used by security companies to monitor video from the solar farms and to respond to alerts, while Campus staff based at the company's head office in Bari oversee system performance.
“We are proud to be Campus's partner in such an important and strategic market,” said Fabrizio Colciago, March Networks CTO. “Campus's experience matches perfectly with our drive to technological innovation and with the focus on customer service that has always been part of our commitment to the market.”