AUTOMATION IN PULSE IRRIGATION USING ARDUINO

Abstract

The current trend in irrigation is to employ automatic operations in the irrigation system, rather than using the manual operation. Automated irrigation has many advantages such as saving of water and energy, reduction in labour cost and high crop yield. Pulse irrigation is an intermittent irrigation strategy based on discharge pulses followed by breaks and is usually employed in micro irrigation systems. In this study, sensors to detect soil moisture, atmospheric humidity, and temperature were used. Arduino is an open-source prototyping platform based on easy-to-use hardware and software. Arduino hardware is microcontroller-based and provides a platform for building digital devices and interactive objects that can sense and control the physical world. Arduino software is an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) used as a programming interface for the Arduino programming language. In this study functions/modules were developed in Arduino programming language for the Arduino micro-controller which acts as a controller incorporating the data from the different sensors to control on-demand high frequency micro irrigation. The Arduino micro-controller was integrated to a LCD screen which displays the status of water available in the soil profile and when irrigation is to be applied. The Arduino board controls a solenoid valve which is switched on and off based on the sensor inputs and the irrigation pulses required. It was found that Arduino can be effectively used for automating pulse irrigation when integrated with soil moisture sensors and humidity and temperature sensor. The irrigation controller developed is highly flexible to varying parameters and the whole system can be easily modified and edited to have a desired system of irrigation.