the film
forum
library
tutorial
contact
Economic and dam related articles

Digital Angel Completes Landmark
RFID Antenna Project at Bonneville Dam

by Kristi Heim
RFID Journal, March 25, 2006

Digital Angel Corporation, an advanced technology company in the field of rapid and accurate identification, location tracking, and condition monitoring of high-value assets, announced that its 16-foot by 16-foot RFID (Radiofrequency Identification) antenna designed to electronically track the salmon population in the Columbia River in Oregon will be installed near the Bonneville Lock and Dam. The antenna, thought to be the world's largest RFID tower, was developed by Digital Angel in conjunction with the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA).

The antenna will be placed in the Bonneville Corner Collector, a high-flow, multi-million dollar surface bypass route developed by the Army Corps of Engineers and the BPA to move fish safely past the Bonneville Lock and Dam. The antenna is capable of electronically detecting previously tagged fish in only 1/30th of a second. Digital Angel is a leader in developing microchips for tagging fish and large RFID antenna systems that, despite their size, can detect and read the standard fisheries encapsulated tags only 12 millimeters long.

When salmon tagged with the passive integrated transponder (PIT) microchips pass through the antenna, the antenna turns on the PIT tag and the PIT tag in turn sends a unique identifying number to operators of the database where important information such as the species, journey origin and age of each fish is logged. Such information is critical for maintaining healthy ecosystems for the indigenous fish population.

"This project demonstrates that our RFID technology has a wide variety of uses," said Kevin McGrath, President and CEO of Digital Angel. "In this case, our technology provides the most efficient and least invasive monitoring capabilities for sensitive objects such as salmon. This tower will help the local community protect a precious natural resource for generations to come."

Since the early 1990s, Digital Angel has been developing, manufacturing and installing implantable passive integrated transponders and reader systems for the federal Columbia and Snake River hydroelectric projects. For the past two years, the Company has been working on the development of large antenna systems, specifically for the Bonneville Corner Collector.

About Digital Angel Corporation

Digital Angel Corporation develops and deploys sensor and communications technologies that enable rapid and accurate identification, location tracking, and condition monitoring of high-value assets. Applications for the Company's products include identification and monitoring of humans, pets, fish and livestock through its patented implantable microchips; location tracking and message monitoring of vehicles and aircraft in remote locations through systems that integrate GPS and geosynchronous satellite communications; and monitoring of asset conditions such as temperature and movement, through advanced miniature sensors.

Digital Angel Corporation is majority-owned by Applied Digital Inc.. For more information about Digital Angel, please visit www.DigitalAngelCorp.com.


Kristi Heim, RFID Journal business reporter
Digital Angel Completes Landmark RFID Antenna Project at Bonneville Dam
RFID Journal, March 25, 2006

See what you can learn

learn more on topics covered in the film
see the video
read the script
learn the songs
discussion forum
salmon animation