Smart irrigation technologies
The application of smart technologies in agriculture and irrigation systems has increased immensely in the recent past. However, the concept called ‘smart irrigation’ still remains a relatively newer concept and needs much more clarity and innovative technologies to be implemented. Most of the existing systems of irrigation controllers that make use of smart technologies are quite complicated with complex capabilities, which are still not adequately clear to the farmers (Bauman et al. 2015). Even though the smart irrigation systems are suitable for commercial usage on a large-scale such as golf course irrigation, they are quite complicated to be understood and used by farmers on a smaller scale (Dobbs et al. 2013). There is no proper knowledge about the existing smart irrigation technologies, which can be assumed to be a baseline for more complicated and advanced research on future smart irrigation techniques. There is no adequate awareness and familiarity with technologies and systems of smart irrigation among the individuals regarding the security measures that should be incorporated for these smart systems in the fields as well as other irrigation lands (Evans et al. 2013). It has to be realized that user-inputs such as understanding of the type of crops, soil as well as surface slope and other critical agricultural information are extremely important to determine the performance of the smart irrigation systems (Sahu and Behera 2015). The identified problem in research in this filed shows that there is no provision for research on issues in within a ‘smart irrigation system security and privacy in the future (Gándara 2014). The provision of research for smart systems is much lesser than what it is in research in a traditional set-up.
Abbasi, A.Z., Islam, N. and Shaikh, Z.A have explained the importance of sensors in smart irrigation systems in their article “A review of wireless sensors and networks applications in agriculture”. The have clearly shown that due to the technology advancements as well as reduction in the chip sizes, the use of sensors in the smart irrigations systems have gained increasingly ore importance. Agriculture is an industry where the sensors as well as their networks are being used successfully in order to derive maximum benefits (Sales, Remédios and Arsenio 2015). The authors have explained how the sensors can be used in the different irrigations technologies and systems and their optimum utilization to obtain benefits in domain security as well as the privacy of the farmers. There have not been extensive research done in the security features of the different irrigations as well as agriculture related information that is being stored on the devices and the sensor operated network. The authors have helped in understanding which sensors should be used for which particular smart irrigation technology and how they can be used to enhance the network security as well as privacy of the fields. They have clearly described the need for wireless sensors in smart irrigation technologies. WSN technologies as well as their applications in the different aspects of irrigations in agriculture and to report the issues in the frameworks of the existing systems have been clearly explained by the authors in this article.
Issues with smart irrigation systems
In another article by Roopaei M., Rad P. and Choo K.K.R which was named as “Cloud of things in smart agriculture: Intelligent irrigation monitoring by thermal imaging”, the authors have clearly explained the importance of thermal imaging in the management. The authors have explained the working principles of the thermal imaging technologies in monitoring the irrigation in the fields and to ensure that any outsiders are not intruding the privacy and security of the fields. The authors have been able to showed that the thermal imaging devices not only helps in the monitoring of irrigation across the fields but also ensure that they also capture thermal images as soon as it traces the presence of any intruders or outsiders in the fields (Porter and Heppelmann 2014). That in turn immediately notifies the farmers or the other concerned security personnel using alarms systems installed with these irrigation-monitoring systems. This article critically examines the important technical as well as ethical and legal issues associated with the use of the thermal devices in the cloud of things that is being implemented in these smart technologies or irrigation monitoring and management. The authors have also provided feedback on how the smart irrigation technologies shave the potential to preserve the water that comes from the different resources including rainwater harvesting. The detailed description of the different techniques of preserving rain water that has been clearly explain by the authors will help the reader have a clear understanding of not only the latest technologies in irrigation management but also water preservation.
Another article names as “Barriers and solutions to smart water grid development. Environmental management” by Cheong S.M., Choi G.W. and Lee H.S has clearly reviewed the development, challenges as well as the solution and recommendations associated to the smart water grid (SWG). The authors have explained the different phases as well as the stages of operations of the smart water grid. They have shown using examples how the cost as well as adoption issues arises and how critical they are in effective monitoring of the smart irrigation management systems. The authors have also explained the multifold advantages of water preservation especially for the water that is allotted for irrigation but are not being used in the irrigation processes (Roopaei, Rad and Choo 2017). The article has critically evaluated the cost as well as adoption issues and the potential benefits of using SWG and how they are developed for sustainability across the world. Adoption issues are critical, potential benefits of SWGs such as efficient water conservation and distribution sustain the development of SWGs around the world. The detailed review from the authors have studies the new rules and regulations that has to be followed by the farmers in the fields whenever they incorporate smart irrigation techniques in their agricultural processes (Jobin 2014). The problems associated to the security as well as the privacy of the farmers and their sense of taking the problem ownerships are explained by the authors. They have also researched about their sense of environmental responsibility that they should take into consideration while incorporating the smart technologies. The different governmental policies and regulations have also been studied in this article and recommendations on consumer literacy on SWG development have been given along with its importance. The government has explained the pilot projects as well as their trial centers on agricultural smart irrigation technologies, which are also funded by the government and their integration with suitable and sustainable water resource management.
Security and privacy of smart irrigation systems
Another article in which a survey was conducted on automatic irrigation systems names as “A SURVEY ON AUTOMATIC IRRIGATION SYSTEM USING WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORK” by Sandeep Kaur, Deepali form the Guru Nanak College of engineering has shown how the smart irrigation technologies and systems were developed in order to optimize the level of water use for agricultural purposes. The smart irrigation systems had a wide range of distributed network that consisted of large number of soil-moisture as well as temperature sensors that were placed in the plant root zones. In addition, the authors have shown how an advanced unit of gateway handles the information from the sensors and triggers the actuators, that in helps in the data transmission through an on-line application. The authors had developed complex algorithms with temperature as well as soil moisture threshold values, which was programmed into the gateway that was microcontroller based. This algorithm would help in monitoring the level of the water quantity in the reservoirs that were stored for irrigation purposes. The system used solar panels as power sources, which had links of duplex communication link that used an interface based on cellular-Internet. The author have clearly explained how they were used in data inspection as well as scheduling of irrigation that was preprogrammed using web pages.
Another journal named “International Research Journal of Engineering and Technology (IRJET),Volume: 03 Issue: 11, by Chaitanya Lotake, Shriganesh Jadhav, Pawan Juare and Chetan Patil have shown how food supply will be a major issue in a country like India with its ever increasing population which has exceeded 1.2 billion. They have explained how important it is for the farmers to adopt to smart irrigation and agricultural technologies since there is another problem of scarcity of rainfall as well as the depletion of the precious resources of water in India and the rest of the world. The water table is being depleted every year by considerable amounts, which is just not causing and issue in agriculture and irrigation but other issues such as famines and draughts (Alagupandi, Ramesh and Gayathri 2014). Therefore citing such researches they have explained how important it is for the farmers in today’s world to use advanced irrigation techniques to ensure that only the required amount of water is being ran sported to the fields for the purpose of irrigation. The remaining water should be stored using proper water storage techniques in order to ensure there is no wastage of the valuable water resources. The authors have research on automatic irrigation systems in order to help the farmers save their time, money as well as power while solving the issues pertaining to irrigation management in the fields and ensure lesser work force and ore automated and mechanized farming processes. The automatic irrigation systems have the capability to detect the changes in humidity as well as temperature in the fields by making use of the sensors that they are loaded with (Kaewmard and Saiyod 2014). That in turn makes the micro controller to send an interrupt signal to the farmer or the concerned authorities thereby enabling them to properly monitor the automatic irrigating systems in the fields.
Literature review
Therefore, it can be understood from the review of the above articles that the different author have researched on different topics of smart irrigation technologies and systems with a common goal to ensure that the privacy as well as the security of the fields and the farmers are improved through the different innovations in the irrigation systems all across the world (Kumar et al. 2014). The differ aspects such as the cost factors advantages as well as disadvantage of using the innovative irrigation technologies have also been discussed in details in each of these articles to give the reader an in depth clear underrating of the possible issues of using the smart technologies. Recommendations for the farmers have also been provided in each of these articles.
Starlab, in collaboration with some other companies have deployed a smart irrigation system in Barcelona that is fully automated and remote controlled, which in turn adds on to the smart city features that Barcelona has exhibited in the past (Rad et al. 2015). Starlab’s contribution in development of the smart irrigation system has helped to improve the monitoring of soil moisture through in situ probes by making use of the Libelium technology (Halahan et al. 2015). It is a sensor-based technology helps in efficient management of the irrigation water network all across Barcelona. Before the project started each of the agriculture fields ere studied in details in order to understand what kind of irrigation was exactly needed in the fields (Harishankar et al. 2014). The Smart Irrigation system made use of soil moisture sensors that measured the humidity as well as the flow of water in the strategic points within the fields.
Conclusion:
Therefore it can be concluded form the following study that even though there are different kinds of areas of research for the smart irrigation systems all across the world especially in the developing countries, its different advantages as well as the disadvantages have to be carefully studied in details before implementing them. This will ensure that the systems are efficiently utilized and the water resources are not wasted. The articles that has been reviewed in this study has provided valuable recommendations for the farmers regarding proper implementation of the smart technologies in the field of irrigation and agricultural technologies.
References:
Alagupandi, P., Ramesh, R. and Gayathri, S., 2014, April. Smart irrigation system for outdoor environment using Tiny OS. In Computation of Power, Energy, Information and Communication (ICCPEIC), 2014 International Conference on(pp. 104-108). IEEE.
Bauman, M.A., Leinweber, C.D., Nelson, C.B. and Rupar, R.L., Nelson Irrigation Corp, 2015. Irrigation system with smart hydrants and related method.
Bauman, M.A., Leinweber, C.D., Nelson, C.B. and Rupar, R.L., Nelson Irrigation Corp, 2015. Irrigation system with smart hydrants and related method.
Dobbs, N.A., Migliaccio, K.W., Dukes, M.D., Morgan, K.T. and Li, Y.C., 2013. Interactive irrigation tool for simulating smart irrigation technologies in lawn turf. Journal of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering, 139(9), pp.747-754.
Evans, R.G., LaRue, J., Stone, K.C. and King, B.A., 2013. Adoption of site-specific variable rate sprinkler irrigation systems. Irrigation Science, 31(4), pp.871-887.
Gutiérrez, J., Villa-Medina, J.F., Nieto-Garibay, A. and Porta-Gándara, M.Á., 2014. Automated irrigation system using a wireless sensor network and GPRS module. IEEE transactions on instrumentation and measurement, 63(1), pp.166-176.
Halahan, P.B., McIntyre, J.P., Coopersmith, M. and Puckett, M., ET Water Systems Inc, 2015. System and method for smart irrigation.
Harishankar, S., Kumar, R.S., Sudharsan, K.P., Vignesh, U. and Viveknath, T., 2014. Solar powered smart irrigation system. Advance in Electronic and Electric Engineering, 4(4), pp.341-346.
Jobin, W., 2014. Dams and disease: ecological design and health impacts of large dams, canals and irrigation systems. CRC Press.
Kaewmard, N. and Saiyod, S., 2014, October. Sensor data collection and irrigation control on vegetable crop using smart phone and wireless sensor networks for smart farm. In Wireless Sensors (ICWiSE), 2014 IEEE Conference on (pp. 106-112). IEEE.
Kumar, A., Kamal, K., Arshad, M.O., Mathavan, S. and Vadamala, T., 2014, October. Smart irrigation using low-cost moisture sensors and XBee-based communication. In Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC), 2014 IEEE(pp. 333-337). IEEE.
Porter, M.E. and Heppelmann, J.E., 2014. How smart, connected products are transforming competition. Harvard business review, 92(11), pp.64-88.
Rad, C.R., Hancu, O., Takacs, I.A. and Olteanu, G., 2015. Smart monitoring of potato crop: a cyber-physical system architecture model in the field of precision agriculture. Agriculture and Agricultural Science Procedia, 6, pp.73-79.
Roopaei, M., Rad, P. and Choo, K.K.R., 2017. Cloud of things in smart agriculture: Intelligent irrigation monitoring by thermal imaging. IEEE Cloud Computing, 4(1), pp.10-15.
Sahu, C.K. and Behera, P., 2015, February. A low cost smart irrigation control system. In Electronics and Communication Systems (ICECS), 2015 2nd International Conference on (pp. 1146-1152). IEEE.
Sales, N., Remédios, O. and Arsenio, A., 2015, December. Wireless sensor and actuator system for smart irrigation on the cloud. In Internet of Things (WF-IoT), 2015 IEEE 2nd World Forum on (pp. 693-698). IEEE.
Order an Essay Now & Get These Features For Free:
Turnitin Report
Formatting
Title Page
Citation
Outline
