NEWS
24
2026
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07
From Diesel Island to Green Signal: The Energy Rebirth of a Pacific Island Nations Broadcasting Station
In the South Pacific, Fiji - 900,000 people spread across 110 of its 330 islands. For the nation's public broadcaster, delivering news and entertainment to the entire population has always been a monumental challenge - weak terrestrial signals, frequent power outages, and the fury of cyclone season have made television reception a distant dream for many residents on remote islands.
In the South Pacific, Fiji - 900,000 people spread across 110 of its 330 islands. For the nation's public broadcaster, delivering news and entertainment to the entire population has always been a monumental challenge - weak terrestrial signals, frequent power outages, and the fury of cyclone season have made television reception a distant dream for many residents on remote islands.
But all of that changed in 2024. Fiji Broadcasting Corporation made a decision - to deploy an off-grid solar-plus-storage system to provide round-the-clock power for a television relay station on a remote island.
The relay station sits on a small island in Fiji's eastern archipelago, nearly 80 nautical miles from the main island of Viti Levu. The island has no grid connection; its only source of power was a diesel generator that had been in service for over a decade.
"Before every cyclone season, we'd have to ship diesel from the main island by fishing boat," says Jone, the Director of Engineering. "We'd bring 3,000 litres at a time, but a cyclone can last two weeks - and sometimes the boats simply can't land."
The cost of transporting diesel was staggering. The landed cost of each litre exceeded FJ$4 - three times the price on the main island. Generator maintenance was a constant headache: the hot, humid marine climate caused frequent breakdowns, requiring major overhauls every six months. And each time technicians travelled to the island, it consumed two full days - one day by boat, one day on the job.
"We ran the numbers," says Jone. "The annual diesel and generator maintenance costs for this relay station exceeded FJ$200,000. And on top of that - when a cyclone hits, the generator often fails even if there's fuel. During outages, the entire eastern archipelago loses TV reception."
The worst outage came in February 2024, when a Category 5 tropical cyclone struck eastern Fiji. Gales tore the roof off the generator building, and seawater flooded the generator. For two full weeks, residents on the island could not watch any television - no news, no weather forecasts, no emergency announcements.
"At that moment, I realised we couldn't go on like this," says Jone.
Jone began researching alternatives. The idea of solar plus storage wasn't new - but he had seen too many failed attempts: ordinary home storage systems failing within months in the island's high heat and humidity; lead-acid batteries at telecom sites lasting only two or three years; and all-in-one storage solutions were simply unavailable - and even if they were, no one would be able to install or service them on the island.
"What I needed was a system that could run stably at 45°C and 90% humidity, a system that required minimal maintenance, and - most importantly - a system that would let me see real-time data from my office on the main island."
Then he came across Victron Energy's application in Fiji's broadcast digitalisation project - Hi Tech Solutions had previously used Victron equipment to power several off-grid relay stations across Fiji. Jone immediately contacted the project team.
"Victron's modular design means we could start with a baseline configuration and optimise it step by step based on actual operating data," says Jone. "And Wysher's 48V 150Ah telecom-grade LiFePO₄ batteries support CAN-bus communication, integrating perfectly with Victron's Cerbo GX controller - which means I can see, from my office hundreds of kilometres away, the battery status, solar generation, and every detail of the entire system in real time."
The Final System Configuration
After multiple consultations with the engineering team - taking into account the relay station's load profile (approximately 3kW of continuous broadcast equipment load, plus occasional peak loads), local solar irradiation, and cloudy conditions during cyclone season - Jone finalised a "high-redundancy, fully monitored" setup:
Component | Model | Qty |
Storage batteries | Wysher 48V 150Ah telecom-grade LiFePO₄ | 6 (parallel) |
Inverter/chargers | Victron Quattro 10kVA | 2 (parallel) |
Solar charge controllers | Victron SmartSolar MPPT 250/100 | 4 |
System controller | Victron Cerbo GX | 1 |
PV system | 80 × 455W monocrystalline panels | - |
Backup generator | Existing diesel generator | 1 |
Monitoring display | GX Touch 70 | 1 |
(Note: The above reflects the actual relay station setup. The system provides 2 days of autonomy without sunshine. Wysher's telecom-grade batteries are modular and support parallel expansion for future load growth. The Quattro's dual AC inputs allow simultaneous connection to the generator and a future second backup source.)
The entire project was installed inside a 20-foot shipping container.
This solution solved several critical problems at once: first, all equipment was assembled and tested in a workshop in Auckland, ensuring the system was fully operational before it ever reached the island; second, the container itself serves as a rugged protective shell, capable of withstanding cyclones and saltwater corrosion; and finally, from the time the container arrived on the island to system commissioning, it took less than five days.
The 80 PV panels were installed on open ground next to the relay station - the installation team first levelled the site with gravel, poured concrete foundations, and then mounted the panels on hot-dip galvanised steel racks at a height of 2 metres above ground - this both protected them from storm-surge flooding during cyclone season and reduced salt-spray corrosion on the panels.
The six Wysher 48V 150Ah batteries were installed in a dedicated cabinet inside the container. Each battery features a standard 19-inch rack-mount design; the six units sit side-by-side in a 6U rack, occupying less than one square metre of floor space. The parallel connection between batteries uses dedicated communication and power cables - CAN-bus synchronises the BMS data from all six batteries to the Cerbo GX controller.
The two Victron Quattro 10kVA units are mounted on the distribution board next to the battery cabinet. They run in parallel synchronisation via VE.Bus cables, with one as master and one as slave, jointly providing clean three-phase AC power to the station's transmitters, encoders, and monitoring equipment.
The four Victron SmartSolar MPPT 250/100 charge controllers are responsible for efficiently converting the solar energy harvested from the 80 PV panels into DC power stored in the batteries. Each controller boasts over 99% conversion efficiency, extracting as much energy as possible from the PV array even on overcast days.
The Cerbo GX controller connects via VE.Bus to the Quattro units, via four VE.Direct cables to the four SmartSolar MPPT controllers, and via CAN-bus to the Wysher batteries' BMS.
The system went live in July 2024. Jone checks the VRM portal almost daily to review system performance data. But the real test came in February 2025.
A Category 4 tropical cyclone struck eastern Fiji. Wind speeds exceeded 170km/h, and torrential rain lasted for three days. PV generation plummeted to less than 10% of normal levels.
But the relay station never went off the air. The six Wysher batteries had been fully charged before the cyclone hit - 43.2kWh of storage was enough to power the station for nearly two days. On the second day of the cyclone, the battery SOC dropped to 40%, and the Cerbo GX automatically started the diesel generator. The generator ran for about six hours, recharging the batteries to 70% before automatically shutting down. On the fourth day after the cyclone, sunshine returned, and the PV system quickly topped up the batteries.
Throughout the entire event, the relay station's television signal did not中断 for a single second. Residents across the eastern archipelago were able to watch news and weather forecasts during the cyclone - knowing the storm's path, knowing when to evacuate, knowing when it was safe again.
"Before, every cyclone meant the generator would fail because the fuel had been contaminated by seawater," says Jone. "Now, I sit in my office in Suva, watching VRM, and I know everything is fine. And the residents on the island - they don't even know there was a power outage during the cyclone. That's what matters most."
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