Student Projects
Contact Information
University: FGI
Team Members (with year of graduation): (1) ZOA ONGUENE GUY CONSTANT, (2) DJOUMESSI KENJIO KARIM EDGAR, (3) KEMGANG HOMB RAMA
Faculty Advisers: BWANGO Adrien Marien
Email Address: geniteking@gmail.com
Submission Language : English
Project Information
Title: AGRO-VHITECH
Abstract:
In northern Cameroon, the cereal deficit has increased in recent years due to the increase in population and climatic hazards, water resources are scarce. Current measures (price regulation markets, promotion of village storage, irrigation method) to stem the deficit prove inadequate. In this context, consider how the food needs of region short and medium term? how to optimize the use of water resources? This is with a view to solve the problems that the project AGRO-VHITECH born. This is the transition from a rural agriculture to precision agriculture.
Project Introduction:
AGRO-VHITECH is a technological system that allows a farmer to automatically control the irrigation system of his exploitation vegetable gardening, oilseeds or grain; of to meet real-time weather data from said exploitation through her mobile phone or her computer. This system uses the combination telephonic (GSM module), computer (Labview) and automation (NImyDaq). Thus, thanks to a dedicated application (Application made on Labview) and automation control modules all connected to an electrical pump, the farmer or the system can control irrigation. The system has a small weather station which address the temperature level, the relative moisture, precipitation, wind speed, solar radiation etc. So that to alert in real time the irrigator by SMS through GSM modem (grafted to the device and we designed) or on a PC with our Labview application so that it takes knowledge instantly climate data of her exploitation. The system also evaluates for each session the volume of irrigation water use, the watering time and send SMS to the operator to enable it to provide precise management (in cubic millimeter meadows) of its water. For extended travel, the farmer can use the alert (as an indicator) to inquire about the status of the water needs of its agricole exploitation. This system adapts to all modern irrigation systems including the California system, the drip system, sprinkler irrigation etc. And works with solar energy.
Design Methodology:
Our work focused primarily on 9 spots as shown in the graph below:
Test of the material receive
Architectural design
General test of final system
Design Architecture
AGROVHITECH The project is formed mainly of a weather station that provides with several sensors such as anemometer, a temperature sensor, a humidity sensor, a pyranometer and a rain gauge which calculate the water balance of the agricole exploitation. With to this calculation, the irrigator may know on her mobile phone or on her PC the daily quantity of water that its agricole exploitation must have in irrigation. With this it will launch the irrigation time required on her PC or let the weather station handle this automatically.
The data acquisition of these sensors in LabVIEW (in our VI) is done through the NI myDAQ.
Temperature acquisition
We use thermistors connected to a pin NI myTemp that is connected to the NI myDAQ.
Relative humidity acquisition
To acquire the relative humidity, we use a humidity sensor HIH-4000-001
Wind speed acquisition (anemometer)
The instrument used here to measure the wind speed is an anemometer with four cups. The choice of four cup anemometer is justified by the fact that our geographic location is not equipped with very strong winds. They are of the order of 4 to 5Km / h. The speed is determined using a system of counting which the main electronic component is a phototransistor is connected to the through NI myTemp. The acquired data are processed by the VI and it shows the wind speed.
Sunshine solar acquisition
The solar panels that provide power the weather station can serve of pyranometer. Indeed, knowing the surface of said panels, we measure with our NI myDAQ the power it delivers and our VI calculates the light intensity per square meter.
This station is also provided in addition to of a battery that stores energy from the solar panels, of a circuit board which contains the circuit regulating the charging of batteries, the control circuit of the pump and the communication circuit using the GSM module and PIC16F877.
Functional Description
For more understanding, we released a functional graph that restores our description made above:
- Anemometer
For the anemometer, we first designed the mechanical part as shown in the figure above.
The idea is to install a diode and a photonic transistor on either side of an opaque plate and hence the propeller rotates and it cuts the beam. Briefly the transistor sent to the myDaq 1 which corresponds to 5V or 0 corresponding to the 0V. NImyDaq thereby receive a square signal.
The aim is to address the emitted signal of the anemometer and of find the frequency of this signal after of apply the formula Speed = (2 * pi * Radius of the anemometer (20cm)*frequency. For the frequency of this signal, we used the Labview code below
- Humidity Sensor
We connect the NI myDAQ to test the operation.
The sensor we used is a reference humidity sensor HIH-4000-001, This is a sensor that sends an analog voltage of 4V to 5.8V and a current of 500 uA. Regarding the relationship between voltage and humidity, the manufacturer gives us the following calibration curve:
Of this curve, we were able to get the following values:
Thus we obtain by numerical methods, an equation approached of the initial configuration table U = 0.031 * H +0.81. It is the latter that allows our Labview program of transform voltages in relative humidity.
Temperature sensor (NImyTemp and Thermistor)
To determine the ambient air temperature, we coupled to the NImyDaq the NimyTemp and we used the Labview code below:
pyranometer and Rain gauge
Nous avons utilisé des panneaux solaires pyranometer, nous faisons l'opération suivante:
((100 - l'efficacité des panneaux solaires) * puissance du panneau solaire + puissance du panneau solaire) * durée de fonctionnement (durée d'ensoleillement).
We chose a rain gauge bucket. Not having manufacture, we are do simply numerical simulations
Labview application
The Labview application is the heart of our work. Indeed, it is formed of a first page that allows you to identify the type of soil, crop and irrigation control from the digital write.
An second page which content is all elements of digital display of the values supplied by the sensors.
The last page shows the result of potential evapotranspiration given by the formula monteith-Penmann [reference: crop evapotranspiration, this book has helped us to understand the method of irrigation water balance], the daily water requirement of the plant, the coefficient cultural
Result and Discussion
The challenges faced
The biggest challenge here was to first of used the NImyDaq, simply because that it repeatedly had a kind of conflict between the various thread running, and we were obliged to we turned to the programming type master-slave for desynchronized for some thread. What us then mark, it is the simplicity of the Labview software. Given that we have, before the arrival of NI, tried performed of the simulations of this project with software such as Micro C, Proteus, but it was very difficult.
Marketing Plan
For the commercialization of our product, we firstly pass through sensitization of farmers and agricultural organizations so they know the merits of this project.
Direct and indirect impact
- irrigate a agricole exploitation
- optimize the working time,
- Release the operator to engage in other activities
- increase the proportion of labor (women and disabled)
- Effectively manage natural resources such as water.
- obtain in real time the climatic Data of an zone
- Achieving Goal southern countries in reducing extreme poverty and hunger that must necessarily go through the proper management of water so irrigation.
- increasing the rate of telephone penetration in rural areas
- creation of traffic among operators
Conclusion
Ultimately, global warming, increasing population, food shortages in developing countries are serious problems hindering the development of the latter. This is with a view to make a difference in local development that AGRO-VHITECH project was born. It will allow a very efficient management of water resources in areas of northern Cameroon which are very dry. This project will lead to the creation of an exchange network between the weather service and farmers in an optical development.
