Live NASA climate data
Off-grid camera check
One score for how hard winter is on a solar camera anywhere in Canada or the US. It reads sunlight, frost and snow from NASA's 25-year climate record, then sizes the panel and battery you would need.
The year, month by month
Bars show what the solar panel you set below would collect each day. The dashed line is the camera's daily use; months below it are drawn in blue. Underneath: frost days and snow depth for each month.
Size the panel and battery
Enter your camera's figures from its listing or manual. Daily use is the energy it uses in a typical day; battery capacity is how much it stores. The starting values are examples only.
Battery in mAh? Multiply by its voltage and divide by 1,000. A 10,000 mAh battery at 3.7 V is 37 Wh.
How the score works
Every number is calculated the same way for every place, from public NASA data. Nothing is estimated by hand.
What a 5 W panel collects on an average day in the dimmest month (5 W × peak sun hours × 0.75 for real-world losses). 1 Wh or less scores 0; 9 Wh or more scores 50.
Average frost days a year, when the temperature drops below freezing. Many lithium batteries cannot charge below 0°C. No frost scores 30; 240 or more frost days scores 0.
Months with an average snow depth of 10 cm or more, when snow is deep enough to bury a low or flat panel. No such months scores 20; 5 or more scores 0.
The score does not cover shade, panel angle or mobile coverage. A 4G camera also needs signal, so check your carrier's coverage map for the exact spot.
Source: NASA POWER monthly climatology, January 2001 to December 2025: all-sky surface shortwave irradiance (ALLSKY_SFC_SW_DWN), frost days (FROST_DAYS) and snow depth (SNODP), fetched live for the location you choose. NASA data is gridded at roughly 1° for sunlight and about 0.5° for weather, so it describes the area, not your yard. Where NASA’s grid cell sits more than 300 m above the town, the tool flags that frost and snow are probably overstated. Place search by Open-Meteo. Scores and panel sizing are MkaeSense calculations and a planning guide, not a guarantee.