Drogenberg is participating in an international project to measure light pollution. The TESS project originates from Madrid University and uses a photometer network.
The original meter was TESS Stars209. The data of this meter are still available on the TESS website. After 3 years of service, it broke down. The plastic wore out due to sun and weather, and broke off. Lesson learned: make sure to wrap everything in aluminum tape.
Current meter is Stars551
Basically this photometer is installed on a rooftop and continuously measures the light. It sends it’s data towards a server in Madrid. It has been installed high, on a dark rooftop to avoid direct light from public lighting. Click on the pictures for a larger format.
The data for this photometer can be found here (Click Here)
Doubleclick the image to zoom out. To zoom in, highlight thart part that you want to see.
Although the sensor employed is the same that uses SQM, it uses a dichroic filter instead of the color filter. The overall response is thus different and fully includes the lines of the High Pressure Sodium (HPS) lamps since the spectral response is extended to the red (see TESS website). My expectations is that the values measured by the TESS photometer are a bit lower then the classic SQM Reader. I used a handheld SQM to measure the difference on a few nights. Within the range SQM 20-20,30 the TESS meter is about 0,15SQM lower (lower number, lighter sky). However by values better then 20,30 the difference seems larger (SQM measures better values).