OWL is a low-cost animal detection system that alerts drivers of the presence of wildlife up ahead to give the driver enough time to slow down their vehicle and give way to the animals to cross the road safely.
High accuracy of wildlife detection
Independent power source
Long distance notification
Fast detection and response
Eco-friendly
Motion Detector
Features
Self-powered system
- Powered by high capacity removable LiPo battery.
​
Long distance notification
- Alert road users up to 400 meters away from location of event
​
Accurate detection of animal
- Sense movement of animals in any condition and ambience.
- High performance sensors accurately measure temperature of animals.
​
Fast Response
- Fast data transmission between input and output systems over 10 Mbps due to Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) communication protocol.
​
Environmental friendly
- Free from any sound and ambient pollution
Specs
Microcontroller (Arduino Mega) - 5V 50mA operating power. 16MHz clock speed, 54 digital (15 PWM) I/O pins.
​
Battery (LiPo battery 9V)- 5000 mAh capacity, 40C.
​
PIR motion sensor (EKMC160511) - 150 degree detection area, 5m horizontal range, 1m vertical range.
​
Temperature sensor (FT-H50K) - 3m measuring range, 0 to 1350 °C temperature rating.
​
Amber light (LMB040) - 12V operating power, 60pcs SMD LEDs.
​
Speaker (LBC 3492) - 125dB volume, -25 to 550C operating temperature.
​
Wire (12 AWG) - 88A withstand current. 100 to 200C temperature rating.
Main system circuit box
Long distance notification
​
Our product can alert the driver about 400 meters before road users reach the location of detection. The slowest animal which is cow takes about 8 seconds to cross the 7 meters road. The vehicle with a maximum speed of 40 m/s will take 10 seconds to arrive at the detection area after entering the alert area without applying the brake.
Meanwhile, we take into consideration the driver applies brake after notice the alert for the first 200 meters and decelerate by 2.5 m/s2. The time taken to reach half of the alert area is 6 seconds. After slowing down, the vehicle takes 8 seconds to enter the detection area for the remaining 200 meters. Therefore, the total time is 14 seconds for the car to arrive at the detection area.
In conclusion, both the situation is safe for the animal to cross the road. Therefore, 400 meters is the best distance between the placement of amber light and speaker in the alert area and the detection area.
High accuracy wildlife detection
​
As humans, our senses have their limitations. We can hear up to 20 meters of normal chatting and our eyes are binocular vision which can roughly see 180 degrees for 2 miles far away. These limitations become more restricted during driving, where we need to focus on the road. The installation of PIR motion sensors (EKMC160511) can detect the animals up to 150 degrees from the side of the road with 5 meters horizontal and 1-meter vertical ranges. It is helpful for us since the roadside is our blindspot and the broad range can sense the animals earlier.
​
Meanwhile, the temperature sensor (FT-H50K) able to sense any animal from 0°C up to 1350 °C. So, it can detect both warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals. These sensors can provide high accuracy to the system during day and night time. For a human, we need to see clearly to detect animals, plus our vision is more limited during the night, which makes the detection quite hard.
Self-powered system
​
Our system uses an independent power source due to the absence of an electric power supply on most of the roadkill hot spots area. Roadkill usually happens on the highway and sometimes in rural areas. Most of this area lacks electric power supply because there are not many residencies in this area. Hence the usage of an independent power supply is a necessity. We use a 9 volts LiPo battery which can supply 5000 mAh capacity power to our Arduino Mega microcontroller. Our controller only requires 50mA power consumption. By dividing battery capacity and the device power consumption, we get 100 hours of battery lifespan. The accessibility to the removable battery in the circuit box will make changing the battery become easier.
Fast response detection and alarm system​
​
For our device to be working efficiently, we need to have a fast transmission time from the sensing devices to the alerting devices. We choose to use 12 AWG wire for our connection medium. We choose to use a wired system over wireless connection because a wired connection is generally high in speed and the data transmission is more stable. These two factors are vital in ensuring the efficiency of our product.
​
We choose to use Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) communication protocol for data transmission from input to output. This protocol can provide data transmission speed up to over 10 Mbps which will give an instantaneous trigger of less than 1 second to the alerting devices. This will provide the driver with sufficient time to slow down their vehicle’s speed.
Harmless to animals and environment
​
Another important factor that needs to be considered is that our system is eco-friendly. This is to ensure that all animals that crossed the road will not be shocked and feel safe when the alert devices are triggered. We choose LBC 3492 loudspeaker with a 125dB volume that is loud enough to ensure the driver can hear. We also put this speaker 400m away from the detection area to ensure the noise is reduced. A noise that is 125 dB at one meter will have an intensity of only 1/100 as much at ten meters which is 20 dB less. At 10 meters the sound is 105 dB. At 100m the intensity is down to 85 dB.
By including other factors that will affect the sound intensity such as wind direction and speed, humidity, terrain, vegetation, and other obstacles, the intensity must be lower than 85 dB which is out of noise pollution range and safe for the environment.
Temperature Sensor
