With most engineering projects, this is a common question raised by the engineering team and the customer (the organization, individual or entity requesting a product or service). The term DATA MANAGEMENT is used to globally define the processes which allow the ease in storage, retrievability and maintenance of information. Information, or data, could be the parts required to manufacture an aircraft wing or personnel files of a Human Resources department. There is almost always a need for data management in any organization. Data management can be a manual or automated process and can enhance administrative, financial and planning processes in areas of engineering and business.
When there are large amounts of data that are required to be presented in numerous ways, an automated data management system is preferred. There are key components common to all automated data management systems. These include:
- Information
- Hardware
- Software
Examples of information were illustrated above. Hardware and software are tools used in the processes of data management manipulate all, or pieces, of your information. The product obtained by combining the key components leads to the creation of a database.
A database is a collection of organized data organized especially for rapid retrieval.
DOES GSPP NEED DATA MANAGEMENT?
The Ghana Solar Power Project’s need for an automated data management system is extremely important!! Why? Since information can be:
- Stored
- Modified
- Integrated
- Accessed
more efficiently than in most manual data management systems.
Several needs were addressed by the GSPP team and the recipient of the project. These included the need to:
- Generate documents/reports for presentation purposes.
- Retrieve information on the basic components of the solar power system, i.e., Control System, Batteries, Power Conditioning system and the Photo voltaic cells, and have that data available in graphical and American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) formats for presentation and manipulation purposes, respectively. (Figure 1 illustrates a typical graphical format)
- Retrieve solar power system data remotely, via electronic means.
- Provide security of data by various levels of authorization.
- Implement the most current, state-of-the-art software and hardware tools to create a sound database management system.
WHAT DATA WILL THE GSPP MANAGE??
The data requiring management for the GSPP are:
Atmospheric information
- daily maximum and minimum temperatures
- average monthly temperature, averaged over several years
- average monthly humidity Solar Insolation
- point-by-point incremental data
- average monthly with standard deviations indicated
Power Consumption
- daily power consumption of appliances (loads) Photo voltaic modules
- daily peak power
- daily module temperature
Direct Current (DC) Batteries
- daily battery energy storage
- number of power hours required to store energy for various loads.
Solar insolation is the solar radiation (energy) that has been received.
As illustrated, that is a lot of data to be manipulated!!!
WHAT STEPS LEAD TO DATABASE CREATION?
Much thought and planning is required in designing a database. With a good database design, there is less time spent back-tracking during the building stage and the result is a database that helps you and anyone else using the database be more productive.
The steps are outlined as follows.
- Determine the purpose of the database.
- Determine how the information can be divided into separate ‘subjects’.
- Determine what information will be kept in each ‘subject’ area.
- Determine the relationships between each ‘subject’ area and adjust information to clarify these relationships as needed.
- Refine the database design by trial and error with sample data sets.
Working with sample data sets is a way to experiment with report formats and graphical charts required of the customer.
In next month’s issue, the data management system to be used by the GSPP will be outlined.
