Thousands of businesses and individuals in the Lazio region of Italy log on to Meteo Regione Lazio online and on social networks every day for a real-time view of local weather conditions. To give them crystal-clear, full-colour, HD video images of the weather, even at night, the company has deployed the latest generation of Hikvision DarkFighter cameras across its network of 373 weather stations.
Individuals, companies, and entire industries made critical decisions based on the weather forecast – whether these related to events planning, planting, harvesting schedules, logistics operations, travel bookings, or any other aspect of life or business.
Additionally, monitoring and understanding changes in climatic conditions over time is critical for informing local and global ‘green’ legislation aimed at reducing the pace and impact of climate change.
To provide the detailed weather and climate data that individuals and organisations need, meteorological research and discovery company Meteo Regione Lazio operates 373 weather stations in Lazio, Italy. These facilities are equipped with sensors that detect various weather and environmental conditions, as well as cameras that share video images of local weather conditions with the company’s followers online.
Established in 2014, Meteo Regione Lazio constantly updates its technology infrastructure to optimise the accuracy of its weather updates, and to provide the best experience for followers accessing weather data and video image feeds.
As part of this strategy, the organisation wanted to equip all of its weather stations in Lazio with the latest-generation CCTV cameras that could provide crystal clear, high-definition, colour video images of the weather, even in extremely low-light conditions.
Gabriele Serafini, CEO at Meteo Regione Lazio, says, “To provide the best video images, 24 hours a day, our weather-station cameras need to be highly robust, resistant to any attempts at vandalism, and able to continue functioning even during adverse weather events, such as high winds and heavy rain. When choosing new cameras, we had to make sure that all these important boxes were ticked.”
After an in-depth assessment of available solutions, Meteo Regione Lazio chose to deploy Hikvision ‘DarkFighter’ CCTV cameras at its 373 Lazio weather stations. These cameras use large-aperture lenses to maximise natural light, supporting high-definition (8mp), full-colour video imaging, even at night.
In line with Meteo Regione Lazio’s requirements for vandalism resistance, the Hikvision cameras are reinforced and designed to be vandal-proof. In addition to protecting the cameras from damage, the DarkFighter cameras are also water and dust-resistant. They will continue functioning even in the worst weather, making them ideal for Meteo Regione’s weather stations.
The 373 Hikvision cameras, which were sourced from local Hikvision distributor Italtec, were easy to deploy at the weather stations, with plug and play features for connecting to the company’s network and FTP servers, which post video images to followers online.
With the latest-generation Hikvision cameras installed at all 373 of its weather stations in the Lazio region, Meteo Regione Lazio can take high-definition, full-colour video images and share them with its followers 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
The cameras also allow the organisation to analyse weather conditions across the region on an ongoing basis, providing invaluable data for researchers and policymakers. “When we saw the quality of the Hikvision images, we decided to renew our camera fleet across the region to provide our followers with professional quality video content,” says Serafini.
As an additional benefit, the cameras are providing the extremely high levels of ruggedness and durability Meteo Regione Lazio needed to provide images of the weather from all its weather stations, in all conditions.
“With the Hikvision cameras installed at our weather stations, we have peace of mind that our operations will not be interrupted, either by vandalism or by extreme weather events,” says Serafini. “This means we can focus 100% of our effort on our core business of collecting and analysing weather data for our followers.”
