SCEL Firmware

The Smart Campus Energy Lab (SCEL) is a Vertically Integreated Project (VIP) at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. SCEL’s primary goal is to collect meteorological data using weatherboxes to help predict weather patterns. With this data, ideal spots for renewable energy sources may be determined and installed in the future. Renewable energy has become as important as ever since it is a cleaner alternative to fossil fuel. Specifically in Hawaii, the government has set a goal to be 100% renewable by 2045. The SCEL lab currently has two hardware teams, Team Apple and Team Guava, one firmware team, and one machine learning team.

As the Firmware Team, our job is to maintain and improve the weatherbox code, while troubleshooting issues the hardware teams are having. In the fall semester of 2022, the Firmware Team worked on the server, gateway, and database while also working with the hardware team to troubleshoot their connectivity issues. Towards the end of the semester, the Firmware Team began researching and implementing the simplified data pipeline. To implement the code, we used SQL and the command line to create the database and C to make changes to the weatherbox schemas.

From this project, I was able to learn the importance of teamwork and time management. The Firmware Team acts as the support center for the whole lab. Without knowing how to communicate well or work together to reach a common goal, nothing would get done in the lab. Not only did this project improve and continues to improve many of my soft skills, but I also learned many technical skills. For example, I learned SQL in order to setup the database on the SCEL lab computer. I also learned how to connect XBEEs to transmit data from one to the other using XCTU.