Silvanet Border Gateway (Gen 2)
The Silvanet Border Gateway provides connectivity between the Silvanet Mesh Network in the forest and the Silvanet Cloud Platform via the Internet.
Dryad's Silvanet Border Gateways sends and receives messages from Silvanet Wildfire Sensors via the Silvanet Mesh Gateways to the Silvanet Cloud Platform. The Border Gateway connects to the Silvanet Cloud Platform is via the Internet (Ethernet, mobile networks and satellite).
The Border Gateway is assumed to be always on (24 hrs) as it needs to listen to any messages sent by the Silvanet Wildfire Sensors.
The Border Gateway is typically placed at the edge of a forest. As the Border Gateways are LoRaWAN compliant, they can also communicate directly with Silvanet sensors if any sensors are within range of the Border Gateway.
Deployment scenarios The Border Gateway can be set up in various deployment scenarios depending on the availability of power supplies, internet connectivity and deployment locations. See Border Gateway deployment scenarios.
Key features
Connects to the Silvanet Mesh Network using LoRaWAN.
Connects to the Internet wirelessly (LTE-M/NB-IoT), wired (Ethernet) or via satellite (as backup):
Wireless connectivity using 4G/LTE-M (with 2G/GPRS fallback) or NB-IoT.
Wired connectivity to routers using its Ethernet adapter.
Satellite connectivity for remote deployments without mobile network coverage and no access to mains power.
Connects to mains power supply using a PoE Injector (Power over Ethernet).
Solar panel to provide daily energy requirements for the Border Gateway, if PoE is unavailable.
Supports FUOTA (Firmware Update Over-the-Air) to allow its firmware to be updated remotely.
Supports the deployment of up to 20 Mesh Gateways.
Directly receives messages from sensors if they are within range.
Supports a range of deployment scenarios. For more details, see Border Gateway deployment scenarios.
Delivered components
Each shipment of a Border Gateway includes the following components:
Silvanet Border Gateway
Solar panel
Treenails (for permanent deployment)
U-Bolt Clamps, M10 nuts and washers
5 meter roll of garden wire (for temporary deployment)
LoRa antenna (North America: 915 MHz, EU: 868 MHz, Asia: 433 MHz)
LTE-M antenna
Satellite antenna
PoE Injector and one power cable
RJ45 CAT6 Ethernet network cable for use with the PoE
Dimensions
The dimensions of the Silvanet Border Gateway is (LxWxH) 27.5 cm (63 cm with antennas) x 46 cm (with the satellite antenna) x 4.5 cm and weighs 1.3 kg.
Power supply
PoE (Power over Ethernet)
The Silvanet Border Gateway includes a PoE Injector to connect to a mains power source.
If a router is available, it can be connected via Ethernet to the PoE.
The PoE provides a voltage range of between 36 V and 57 V and it IEEE 802.3af compliant.
For more details, see Border Gateway deployment scenarios.
Power outage
When a relatively short power outage occurs, the Border Gateway's supercapacitors allow the device to continue receiving power.
Should a power outage occur for an extended period, such as 10 hours of even several days, the solar panel guarantees a power supply to the Border Gateway by charging its supercapacitors until the power supply is restored.
Should a power outage occur for an extended period of time, resolve the power supply issues as soon as possible to ensure the Border Gateway is not entirely dependent on the solar panel for its energy requirements. Of course, if the solar panel is the only option, the Border Gateway can continue to operate. See next section.
Solar panel only
For off-grid locations and other places where a mains power supply is unavailable, the external solar panel provides the daily energy requirements and ensures charging capabilities to the device's supercapacitors.
During the night when the solar panel loses generating capacity, the Border Gateway's supercapacitors allow the device to continue receiving power. This ensures a continuous power supply to the Border Gateway.
The cable between the Border Gateway and the solar panel is 2 m long and is pre-connected.
Power Saving Mode
To reduce overall power supply requirements, the Border Gateway's modem wakes up ever hour and stays on for five minutes to send a message (a "heartbeat") to the Silvanet Cloud to indicate it is alive.
The Border Gateway's internal supercapacitors provide a power supply of 5415Ws. These capacitors provides a large amount of power for a short duration (for example, when it sends a "heartbeat") and is continuously recharged from an external power supply (PoE or solar panel).
Use of supercapacitors Power supply is stored in supercapacitors rather than rechargeable batteries as rechargeable batteries can ignite. This would defeat the purpose of a wildfire detection system.
Internet Connectivity
To provide Internet connectivity, the Border Gateway supports Ethernet and both LTE-M (Cat-M1) and NB-IoT.
For LTE-M, the Border Gateway requires access to a 4G network with 2G fallback (GPRS). An LTE-M antenna is provided to connect to a 4G network.
Satellite (backup) connectivity is provided should Ethernet and LTE-M become unavailable or if the Border Gateway is deployed in a remote location. An antenna is provided for Satellite uplink using a satellite network.
Satellite uplinks provide Fire alerts only A Satellite uplink should only be used for remote deployments where there is no mobile network coverage AND no access to mains power. However, the Border Gateway sends only fire alerts when using satellite connectivity.
Firmware updates (FUOTA)
The Border Gateway supports FUOTA (Firmware Update Over The Air) with high flexibility. Large file transfers are successfully made securely and reliably even with eventual interruptions of the power supply and, consequently, sensor operation.
Firmware is updated using a chunked image transfer (no compression). All Silvanet sensors in a Site are updated at the same time using Multicast. To do this the LoRaWAN Network Protocol is temporarily switched to Class B which allows two-way communication.
To cope with low power and the various regional regulatory requirements, both the downlink fragment size as well as the periodicity are highly configurable allowing for stretching a FUOTA process even to a week.
For more details, see Firmware Updates (FUOTA).
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