Self Powered Instrumentation Equipment and Machinery Using Solar Panels

Energy and water are required by any human being in order to live decently. Most of the rural population of the developing world lives without access to formal electrification. Electricity is one of the prerequisites for significant sustainable economic growth, being a reliable and reasonably priced energy essential for value-added agricultural and postharvest processes. Modern energy supply also enables more intensive agriculture by providing irrigation (pumps) and immediate post-harvest treatment (cooling) and storage. Solar radiation can be converted into electricity using photovoltaic panels. Industrialized countries present a trend towards grid-connected photovoltaic systems, as battery energy storage is not required and the electricity is supplied to the network. Therefore, it is more economically interesting to supply the electricity produced by a photovoltaic system to the electricity network than to use it to drive a chiller. Providing a reliable water supply for both human water pumping systems and agricultural needs in rural areas is one of the main applications of PV energy. The least expensive method of pumping water using PV energy is by connecting a DC motor without batteries (Abidin & Yesilata, 2004). Battery-less systems that directly couple PV modules to variable speed DC pump motors seems to have high potential for energy efficient and cost effective reverse osmosis desalinization (Ghermandi & Messalem, 2009). A simple irrigation fuzzy logic model analyzed the pumping system together with the crop to obtain the time of year to irrigate for compensating the lack of water (Damak et al., 2009). The use of pumped water for energy storage is an innovative alternative to battery storage due to its unlimited storage duration (Manolakos et al., 2004). Many machines have been constructed thinking in photovoltaic powering. As photovoltaic panels can provide excellent energy on places with daily radiation of 4-6 kWh/m2 prototypes are being constructed so that life becomes easier. For example, in African countries milling the average daily consumption (2.5 kg of grain) takes three hours (Chinsman, 1985). A PV-driven stone mill was constructed using two 50 W PV-panels and a battery of 85 Ah. Feed costs on dairy farms accounts for approximately half the cost of producing milk (Gardner et al., 1995). The feed dispensed to animals was measured to be within 6% of the programmed ratio and the cows adapted to eat from the feeder with training. The solar panels worked efficiently charging the batteries to provide 2.5 days of