French IoT firm Kerlink’s Wirnet iStation gateways are helping power multiple LoRaWans in wind-energy parks high above the North Sea in the Netherlands.

One of the LoRaWan gateways installed on the Borssele Alpha platform, managed by Dutch transmission system operator Tennet Holding, links 700MW of offshore wind farms to the Dutch power grid. The LoRaWan, which was deployed and is operated by SkyLab, Kerlink’s partner in the Netherlands, enables various safety applications, such as search-and-rescue systems, life jackets with precision location capabilities, emergency-location beacons, and buoy trackers.

Skylab’s deployment is composed of outdoor industrial-grade Kerlink Wirnet iStation gateways, embedding a feature called “dual packet forwarder” that enables the orchestration of data transmission simultaneously on multiple LoRaWans. This helps increase connectivity in the North Sea area for all potential users – shippers, electricity providers and consumers, and businesses and area residents.

Private, public and commercial networks can thus run simultaneously. The ability to deliver data to different types of servers allows the flexible adaption of different types of use cases and shows the capacity and versatility of the gateways to support network sharing with other infrastructures, as well as the possibility to add more densification with different gateways.

“This LoRaWan deployment is unique because it serves multiple-user LoRaWans,” said SkyLab director Remy de Jong. “It supplies IoT coverage to a challenging and sometimes harsh North Sea environment high above ground level on platforms and wind turbines. The result enables smart applications and all types of wireless sensors and devices where they have not been deployed previously.”

In addition to widely used IoT applications serving key vertical markets, the North Sea connectivity will support several safety applications, such as search-and-rescue operations, which are enhanced with SkyLab’s emergency location beacon that speeds up rescue in man-overboard situations. The applications also will enable climate and weather monitoring, and asset tracking, via gateways deployed.

“This project with SkyLab demonstrates the continuously growing range of IoT deployments that can improve business efficiency, customer service and safety,” said Stéphane Dejean, Kerlink CMO. “And as with Kerlink’s previous projects in the Netherlands that are bringing cost-efficient LoRaWan connectivity with multiple benefits to new and existing business sectors, these applications will find new markets that want to deploy them, leveraging Kerlink IoT gateways’ proven performance, robustness, and reliability.”

These IoT gateway deployments extend a series of Kerlink’s projects in the Netherlands. The most recent deployment was in the port of Moerdijk, where a LoRaWan was installed with SkyLab on a large wind farm in 2020. In addition to monitoring weather and sea traffic, it enables IoT connectivity to businesses and households in the port.

In 2019, Kerlink gateways were installed in a joint deployment of a LoRaWan private IoT network at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, one of the largest international airports in Europe. That network offers coverage in all public areas such as the arrival and departure halls, lounges, piers, and Schiphol Plaza, and in non-public areas such as the baggage basements and aprons.

More than 200,000 Kerlink installations have been rolled out with over 350 clients in 70 countries. Based in France, with subsidiaries in the USA, Singapore, India and Japan, Kerlink is a co-founder and board member of the LoRa Alliance and the uCIFI Alliance.