# An Internet of Things-Based Low-Power Integrated Beekeeping Safety and Conditions Monitoring System
## 4 Proposed IBSMC System Experimentation
### Scenario II: New Beehive Arrays Thermopad and Peltier Actuators Experimentation  
In this scenario the thermopad and the peltier actuators of the new beehive cells are put to test. For this test, a plastic beehive is used with foam insulation and the above actuators are installed. The purpose of this test is to measure the hourly temperature difference achieved and energy consumed by the thermopad actuator at 0 \({}^{\circ}\)C environmental temperature as well as the peltier actuator at 36 \({}^{\circ}\)C. Temperature measurements are recorded with the use of a DB18B20 temperature sensor placed in the center of the brood box, while energy consumption measurements are taken using the power data logger measurement instrument at the MCU input. The MCU unit enforces a periodic on-off cycle for the thermopad actuator of different activation time/minute, starting from 2 s/min on time up until 16 s/min on time. Each experiment lasts for 1 h and measurements of maximum temperature difference (\({}^{\circ}\)C) and total energy consumption in Wh is recorded. Figure 5(a) shows the thermopad and peltier actuators maximum thermal difference achieved from the environment temperature over the actuator activation (on) time, expressed as seconds per minute for a time interval of 1 h. Figure 5(b) shows the total calculated energy expenditure in Wh for each one of the subsystems used. From the above experimental results, it is obvious that the thermopad actuator that uses activation times of 2, 4 and 8 s per minute can offer 2 \({}^{\circ}\)C, 3.6 \({}^{\circ}\)C and 6.3 \({}^{\circ}\)C of thermal difference between the internal beehive cell and the external environment at 0 \({}^{\circ}\)C of environmental conditions, by spending a min-max of 0.25-0.75 Wh of hourly use. For daily use, the thermopad system maximum energy consumption is 2.4 Wh, that can be successfully drained from a 5 V 10,000 mAh battery cell, leaving space for the other ISMC systems to operate as well as daily charge back at maximum by a 6 V-10 W panel. Figure 6(b) also shows the temperature increase inside the beehive cell over the thermopad actuators use expressed by its energy consumption in Wh. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c} \hline \hline \multirow{3}{*}{**3G/4G transponder**} & Max. & Transmission- & Min 3G/4G power & 3G/4G connection & Time until battery depletion \\  & Battery & Sleep period (min) & consumption on & time (s) & (days) \\ \cline{2-6}  & 10,000 & 1 & 310–360 & 5–20 & 20–30 \\ \hline \multirow{3}{*}{**LoRaWAN transpoder**} & Max. & Transmission- & Min LoRaWAN Tx & LoRaWAN Tx & Time until battery depletion \\  & Battery & Sleep period (min) & and sensors power consumption (mA) & OTAA join and Tx time (s) & Time until battery depletion \\ \cline{1-1} \cline{2-6}  & 10,000 & 1 & 120–130 & 0.3–2 & 105–170 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 2: Cross comparison of 3G/4G transponders with LoRaWAN transponders. Since low temperatures-offered thermal comfort is a more important factor for the apiary with respect to high temperatures where water deposits can be used instead, the peltier actuator uses the minimum activation time of 2 seconds per minute and can offer 3.5 \({}^{\circ}\)C of thermal difference between the internal beehive cell and the external environment at 36 \({}^{\circ}\)C of environmental conditions. This is twice as much as from the thermopad actuator using the same energy footprint, as denoted by Figure 6a,b. The peltier actuator, however, spends twice the energy of the thermopad actuator, 0.5 Wh of hourly use, for the same activation time (2 s/min). Nevertheless, for daily use, the thermopad maximum operation time is less than 1 h (48 min), leaving its maximum energy consumption as less than 0.5 Wh. Figure 7a also shows the temperature decrease inside the beehive cell over the peltiers' actuator use expressed by its energy consumption in Wh.