IoT Based Drip Irrigation and Weather Forecasting

6 min readMar 1, 2022

IoT Based Drip Irrigation and Weather Forecasting

Introduction:

India and its villages development is really based on the agriculture and the occupation of farming. The agricultural sector is really dependent on water. The agriculture depends on the monsoons when there is the right amount of rainfall the fields need, and serves as an infinite source of water. As we know about the irrigation system around us, the plants should be supplied water according to their soil type. The scarcity of water plays a major barrier for the agricultural development. While working in agriculture, we need to keep in mind the two important factors — Soil’s fertility and Soil’s moisture content. Most of the nations are ranked keeping the factor of their agricultural growth. Water consumption really plays an important role in development of agricultural fields. But the agriculture sector has really gone down in the past years because of the unexpected climatic changes happened in the environment. Greenhouse effect, huge rises in temperature, Global Warming, Dryness of the water bodies around us are the major reasons for these climatic changes. The sudden climatic changes in the environment causes the change around the climatic rainfall. As the climatic rainfall changes it really plays an important role in the change of the ground water. The ground water is one of the most important reasons for the crop growth. The recent studies show that 20 to 25 % of the water given is wasted due to leakage in pipes, water theft, improper water systems. The farmers start in the working of their fields in the starting of monsoons, now they get sufficient water due to proper rainfall but at the end they really face issue because of water scarcity. Farmers around the world during this crisis tend to buy water by spending more money from external vendors to irrigate their fields, if for any reason there is an occurrence of natural disaster then they suffer huge losses. There are different types of techniques present and applied to reduce the dependency on rain. One of mostly preferred technique is generally controlled and driven using the power scheduling and electrical power. In the given technique, we have placed a water level indicator in water reservoir and we place the soil moisture and the temperature sensors in the plant’s root, the designed unit handles the received sensors data and it is then transmitted to the given controller which in turns the control of water through the created valves.

Features:

· Most efficient water and nutrient delivery system for growing crops.

· Delivers water and nutrients directly to the plant’s root zone, in the right amounts, at the right time, so each plant gets exactly what it needs, when it needs it, to grow optimally.

· Enables farmers to produce higher yields while saving on water as well as fertilizers, energy.

· Micro-irrigation system that has the potential to save water and nutrients by allowing water to drip slowly, place water directly into the root zone and minimize evaporation.

· Reduces the impact of drought and climate change on food production.

· Supports rural communities, reduce poverty and reduce migration to cities.

· High availability of water and nutrients

· No saturation and good soil aeration

Motivation:

· There are many reasons to leave the traditional farming techniques and applying to the drip irrigation system, most important reason is the water scarcity.

· The water resources are rapidly diminishing today due to high rise in environmental pollution around us and greenhouse effect.

· No proper rainfall can be found in many areas due to which many areas and the farmers depend solely on agriculture face difficulties.

· Due to less rainfall, farmers need to get and supply water to the crops and use more money and fertilizers than needed which may hinder the crop growth.

· When water would be supplied, there can be cases when the water limit will be reached but yet the crop keeps on getting water and it leads to water wastage.

· Due to water wastage, many of countries of the world don’t even get the sufficient water for their daily needs.

· Various studies in the past really show that our ground water level has really fallen to very lower level due to which the crop growth has also become bad.

Companies that deal in Drip Irrigation:

· Netafim: It is an Israeli irrigation equipment manufacturer. Drippers, dripper lines, sprinklers, and micro-emitters are all manufactured by the firm. Netafim was the global leader in the rapidly increasing drip- and micro-irrigation business in 2012. It was the world’s leading provider of drip irrigation systems, with a 30% worldwide market share.

· Jain Irrigation Systems: It is a worldwide company headquartered in the Indian city of Jalgaon. JISL is also capable of working with dry vegetables, spices, concentrated and frozen fruits, and pulp. It also provides entire projects and agronomical assistance. In 2015, the company was ranked eighth on Fortune’s ‘Change the World’ list.

· Eco Flo India: It is a top drip irrigation system business in India and throughout the world. They are also one of the leading irrigation system manufacturers in India and have the greatest micro irrigation systems in the world. Farmers may now save a lot of money on fertilizer by using drip irrigation. This has resulted in higher yields and higher quality, stem consultants and suppliers in India and throughout the globe.

· Niagara Solutions: It is the leading high-quality Drip irrigation system supplier in the state of Tamil Nadu, India. The products are preferred by farmers as it offers the best cost per hectare. Drip irrigation gives farmers an efficient and simple way to operate their farms.

· Tule: Developer of irrigation solutions for farming businesses. The solution consists of wireless sensors which sense water evaporation from soil & plant tissues and water usage trends from irrigation pipes. The data is sent to a web platform that analyzes and recommends watering actions required, provides weekly email reports, and instant alerts. Also provides iOS compatible software applications.

Components Required:

Hardware

· NodeMCU

· Soil Moisture sensor

· DHT11 sensor

· Relay

· Motor pump

· Breadboard

· Jumper wires

· USB cable

Software

· Arduino IDE

· Blynk

Real-time Implementation:

Block Diagram:

Connections:

The Transmitter module consists of a DHT 11 sensor, Soil Moisture sensor interfaced with the Node MCU. The below given image represents the Transmitter system.

· We have used DHT11 sensor for measuring the temperature and humidity

· We have used Soil Moisture sensor for measuring the soil’s moisture content.

The Receiver module consists of a Motor pump which is controlled using the Relay module. The below given image represents the Receiver system.