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Cold chains don’t just depend on refrigeration; they also need plenty of visibility. Logistics providers must know for sure that their shipments never thawed en route. Enter – IoT cold chain monitoring.
After all, the cold chain moves products that directly affect human health, from frozen foods to life-saving pharmaceuticals. Serious temperature anomalies can be dangerous, whether they occur in the warehouse, the trailer, the store, or anywhere in between.
Even small fluctuations in temperature can reduce a product’s shelf life, driving costs up considerably. In one study, short temperature fluctuations from 4 to 7 degrees Celsius (39.2 to 44.6 degrees Fahrenheit) were enough to seriously affect shelf life for both pork and poultry.
Luckily, the Internet of Things provides the real-time visibility you need to protect your cold chain—or act immediately if something goes wrong. With the right IoT system, you can automate data collection according to your precise temperature monitoring plan. That makes compliance a breeze.
If temperatures do rise too high, IoT sensors let you know. You can act quickly to avoid losing the shipment, or at least immediately identify compromised loads so they don’t end up harming anyone.
Every stakeholder across the cold chain—from manufacturers to warehouse managers, from distributors to third-party logistics companies—can benefit from IoT systems that deliver 100 percent visibility.
But how do you get started? Good news: It’s simpler than you think. Just grab these four types of IoT hardware, connect to a network, and start collecting the data you need to keep your cold chain intact at every step.
IoT for the Cold Chain: 4 Essential Hardware Solutions
Like any IoT system, a cold chain monitoring solution requires three things: sensors, wireless connectivity, and an IoT platform for managing your data (and devices). The best place to start is with the hardware.
Here are the four key things you’ll need to bring IoT to your cold chain:
1. Temperature and Humidity Sensing Technology
Wireless, digital temperature sensors are your first line of defense against cold chain spoilage. These thermometers measure ambient air temperature and send accurate readings back to your IoT platform.
Many temperature sensors also measure humidity, which can be an essential data point for many products that move through your cold chain. Just be sure the sensor’s temperature range covers your shipments; when in doubt, look for a range of -40 to 125 degrees Celsius (-40 to 257 degrees Fahrenheit).
For reasons we’ll discuss shortly, choose temperature/humidity sensors that can connect via Bluetooth® Low Energy.
2. Door Status Sensors
A temperature sensor can tell you when your cold chain is breaking down, but a door sensor can help you prevent temperature spikes in the first place.
These small, wireless sensors detect the status of any door or window, whether it’s open or closed. Outside the cold chain, they’re usually used for security—but in cold chain logistics, they can help you close refrigerator doors before the heat gets in.
That’s valuable for refrigerated warehouses. It’s good for refrigerated trucks. But it’s especially helpful at the grocery store, where customers often forget to close refrigerator doors.
With door sensors in place, your IoT system can instantly notify staff when a door to a temperature-controlled display is left open, saving both energy and, potentially, entire shelves full of product. As with your temperature sensors, look for models that connect through Bluetooth® Low Energy.
3. Location Beacons and Tags
Location-tracking technology has become essential for the modern cold chain. It simplifies scheduling and handoffs across the shipping journey. It provides extra security, reducing loss and theft. And it offers valuable performance data to remove delays as they arise.
You can attach location beacons or tags to vehicles or trailers. You can place them directly onto pallets or cartons. And – you can even use wearable beacons to improve staff management. This technology provides the real-time visibility you need to keep cold shipments safe—and more efficient than ever before.
4. Mobile Gateways
Temperature/humidity and door sensors provide the visibility you need to protect shipments across your cold chain. But you still need hardware that can help transmit that data, wirelessly, to your IoT cloud platform. That’s what a mobile gateway is for.
If you plan to use the same gateways across the cold chain, cellular connectivity is your best bet. Look for mobile gateways that connect through IoT-specific cellular technologies, like LTE-M, NB-IoT, and 4G Cat 1.
These cellular networks move data to the cloud, but how do you get data from the sensor to the gateway in the first place?
This is where Bluetooth® Low Energy comes into play. This close-proximity wireless technology works well for gateways, which you can locate near several sensors—at the warehouse, on a refrigerated trailer, or at the end-point facility.
Your sensor collects data and then sends it to the gateway. The gateway connects to a cellular network and then sends sensor readings to the cloud. The cloud connects to your platform, and the journey is complete. You get the data you need to run your cold chain more effectively—and prevent costly mishaps.
IoT Hardware for a More Effective Cold Chain
Before the rise of IoT, we tracked cold chain shipments with paper logs and phone calls. We lost visibility for long stretches of time. We had to rely on manual reporting to verify temperature integrity. The process was expensive and error-prone.
With real-time visibility—and automated, accurate measurements—all of these problems disappear. Our cold chains become stronger, safer, and simpler to operate. That helps to explain the explosive growth of IoT for cold chain monitoring, which is expected to grow to a global market value of $23.1 billion by 2033. That’s a compound annual growth rate of nearly 14 percent over a whole decade.
Clearly, IoT is no longer a nice option for cold chain operators; it’s essential for maintaining competitiveness. Those who don’t adopt IoT risk being left behind. The good news is that getting started with cold chain IoT isn’t an insurmountable task. As we’ve shown, all it takes is four pieces of IoT hardware. Get started today.
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