German company Opus, who’s own smart system – greenNet – works with Apple HomeKit via their SmartHome Gateway, has introduced a smart smoke and gas alarm that has a built-in solar panel! I know what you’re thinking, but actually, the device itself does contain a long life battery that will last for the typical 10 years, with the solar panel acting as a backup it seems. According to the Opus website, the Opus Smoke alarm device…

…is part of the OPUS greenNet product family. It detects the development of smoke or combustion gas and warns reliably by the sound of a loud siren. In conjunction with the OPUS SmartHome Gateway, the OPUS smoke alarm device sends a message to your Apple device, triggers all other OPUS smoke detectors in your SmartHome, switches on lights and opens shutters.

In addition to the smoke & gas detector, priced at just under €119, the company offers an ‘instantaneous’ water detector for an eye-watering (no pun intended) €138. The water sensor uses energy harvesting technology via a photovoltaic cell (which we assume the black panel on the front is) to power itself, although there’s also an option to use a 1/2 AA lithium battery. These seem like mildy impressive devices, although with the Opus gateway costing around EU€600, this isn’t a system for the budget conscious. Of course, Opus don’t solely rely on Apple Homekit and have their own system to work with all of their products, so this is what one would consider ‘high-end’, but with the aforementioned gateway the vast majority of their switches and sensors will work with Apple HomeKit. If you’ve got money to burn, you can check out their range of switches, and sensors at myopus.eu.