Development of Solar Powered Irrigation System

Development of Solar Powered Irrigation System AI Abdelkerim1, MMR Sami Eusuf2, MJE Salami3, A. Aibinu4, and M A Eusuf5 1, 2,3 Department of Mechatronics Engineering, International Islamic University Malaysia,4Federal University of Technology, Mina, Nigeria, and 5Department of Architecture, International Islamic University Malaysia E-mail: [email protected] Abstract. Development of a solar powered irrigation system has been discussed in this paper. This system would be SCADA-based and quite useful in areas where there is plenty of sunshine but insufficient water to carry out farming activities, such as rubber plantation, strawberry plantation, or any plantation, that requires frequent watering. The system is powered by solar system as a renewable energy which uses solar panel module to convert Sunlight into electricity. The development and implementation of an automated SCADA controlled system that uses PLC as a controller is significant to agricultural, oil and gas monitoring and control purpose purposes. In addition, the system is powered by an intelligent solar system in which solar panel targets the radiation from the Sun. Other than that, the solar system has reduced energy cost as well as pollution. The system is equipped with four input sensors; two soil moisture sensors, two level detection sensors. Soil moisture sensor measures the humidity of the soil, whereas the level detection sensors detect the level of water in the tank. The output sides consist of two solenoid valves, which are controlled respectively by two moistures sensors. 1. Introduction The irrigation system is defined as a system that distributes water to targeted area. Basically, it is meant for agriculture purposes. The efficiency of the irrigation is based on the system used. Since antiquity, the human life is based on agriculture and the irrigation system is one of the tools that boost agriculture. There are many other types of irrigation system all over the world but these irrigations are encountering many problems. In fact, there are few modern systems but they mostly fail in one way to another. The automation plays an important role in the world economy; therefore, engineers struggle to come out with combined automatic devices in order to create complex systems that help human in its activities so that the system automatically processes itself without any human intervention. So we would like to develop an automatic irrigation system. Basically, the paper consists of electrical part and mechanical part. The electrical part consists of photovoltaic, which is meant to generate power and the power is stored in the rechargeable battery. The mechanical part consists of pump to pump out the water from the water source. There are two solenoid valves that are used to control the water flow. Additionally, Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) is interfaced with SCADA (Supervisory Control Data Acquisition) system developed in a personal computer (PC) using LABVIEW. SCADA system is used for controlling the automation system via computer so there is a need to develop HMI human-machine interface employed to communicate with automation device like PLCs and other computers, like water computers. Water is recognized as a source of human life, as well as plants and animals. Therefore, the water needs to be managed properly without any waste. The proper management of any liquid is very significant, especially in our case of water management of the irrigation system. The best liquid management is provided by SCADA. The parameters in the project are soil humidity condition, water level condition, the position of the Sun and SCADA system. Humidity of the environment plays a major role in agriculture development. Due to the high cost and the effectiveness of the system, that has yet to be proven, watering process based on these parameters is not widely used in the World, as it is still a very new technology that tends to post modernize the agriculture. Most of the existing systems are manual system. The manual system needs labor for monitoring the productivity and health crop. Considering labor’s salary, the system will cost much more than the automatic system, in which there is no assistance to the system. The solar system is used to generate the power to the entire system and the solar system is much cheaper than the electrical system. It is suitable to the rural area that is why the solar system is used as a power supplier to replace DC motor electricity source. In fact the initial cost of solar installation is higher than use of DC electrical motor but the solar system has no bill compared to electrical which has bill to pay every month. It is a versatile source of renewable energy that can be used in any application. Solar power is also clean and pollution free. As it is stated in the paper, the discussion is about the development of an intelligent irrigation system, which can be used in plantation. The utilization of greenhouse concept is used in the paper for reducing atmosphere pollution. The system consists of hardware and software and, finally, the integration of the two parts to provide the results. The hardware system consists of the sensors, actuators, drivers and PLC. The software is all about designing SCADA system, in which, it has the ability to read from the automatic system and write into the system. In software design, there is a need for full development of NI instruments, such as DSC module, OPC server, MODBUS server. In hardware design, we need all the components that are necessary to accomplish the project, and these components are PLC, DC water pump motor, actuators, sensors and some minor components like tank and reservoir. 2. Related Work In this section, we are going to review papers and books related to SCADA based irrigation system. The system is divided in three different branches, as SCADA, PLC and Solar Panel, and the literature review consists of the aforementioned three independents parts. SCADA, which is known as the supervisory control and data acquisition, happens to be a computer system for assembling and analysing real time data. Furthermore, SCADA is frequently regarded as the central system that controls and monitors an entire system that is expansively distributed over an extended distance. Remote Terminal Unit (RTU) and Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) are responsible for performing automatically in regards to the size of the site. However, there is always a restriction by the host control functions towards the central site over-ride or supervisory level capability. Essentially, the SCADA system consists of hardware and the software parts. Remote Terminal Unit (RTU) gathers information from the inputs devices such as sensors, valves, motors, alarms and many more. RTU can be a programmable logic controller (PLC) as well as computer. RTU collect all the system information and keep it the memory until the master terminal unit (MTU) send the request to transmit data [9]. MTU collects all the data stored and sends information to the device for interference operation. MTU can be a computer consisting of Human Machine Interface (HMI) as medium of communication for processing data and information. HMI human machine interface provides a centralized monitoring and controlling system for the various inputs and outputs [9]. The communication is very important part of SCADA system, as it is a way of establishing connection between MTU and RTU. Through communication server the device send the signal from the site to the server device so that the data can be processed and the system can make decision based on the processed data. The basic communication types are LAN local area network, wireless and radio signal [12]. NI LABVIEW software can communicate with a Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) in a variety of ways. In order to make a successful communication with PLC, Modbus serial communication protocol was made available by Modicon in 1979, and it was then expanded to the TCP protocol. Modbus turned into one of the regular communications medium in the industry, as it included real-time and historical trending, tools for logging data to a networked historical database, organization of events and alarms. Modbus also assists in networking LabVIEW Real-Time targets and Modbus devices into a whole system, 5. Conclusion This paper managed to stumble upon the fact that the largest advantage of solar energy is its attribute as being free and unlimited source of energy. We have also found out that the research of the development of solar irrigation system requires vast knowledge and familiarity about renewable energy, as well as other parameters of control. The parameters of the system that have been used in the project are soil moisture sensor, light detecting sensor and level sensors. The design of SCADA system is meant for adding an operator on automatic irrigation system. Through SCADA system, the operator can read and write data from the controller (PLC) in addition to this there is a report of the system in excels form and that can be printed. After continuous work and effort, it was manageable to test the system by making it function properly. This project is very vital for all systems that deal with liquid monitoring and controlling specially in the irrigation field. The SCADA system helps administrators to control and monitor irrigation system. As stated, the project can be expanded to oil and gas monitoring system and greenhouse implementation system. Based on the result obtained from measurement, the system performance is quite reliable and accurate. The system has successfully overcome quite a few failings of the existing system by reducing the power consumption, maintenance and automatic system interface with SCADA system. 6. References [1] Harrism (2009). Solar Powered Automated Greenhouse Irrigation System [2] Morris And Lynne (2008). Solar-Powered Livestock Watering Systems [3] B.L.S. Lui (2006). Trial Use of Solar Power Automatic Irrigation System [4] Noko And Road (2005). Solar International Botswana (Pty) Ltd. [5] B. Eker* (2009). Solar Powered Water Pumping Systems [6] Vick And Almas (2008). Developing Wind And/Or Solar Powered Crop Irrigation Systems For The Great Plains [7] Helikson ,Haman And Baird (2009). Pumping Water For Irrigation Using Solar Energy [8]SCADA Retrieved from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/scada [9]SCADA System Retrieved From: www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/wr/measuring/images/pdf/scada_systems.pdf [10] Richard Hantula (2009). How Do Solar Panels Work. [11] Irrigation. Retrieved from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/irrigation [12] James M. Ebeling (2010). Computer Monitoring & Control Technology [13] Halvorsen. (2012). Opc And Real-Time Systems in Labview [14] More Ebooks Retrieved from: http://artikel-software.com/blog [15] Tenable Network Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/tenable_network_security Acknowledgments We would like to thank 3Dr. Momoh and 4Dr. Musa for his immense support in helping us with this paper. Appreciation goes to the Faculty of Engineering, International Islamic University Malaysia, for giving us the opportunity to implement the necessary experiment for acquiring the result. Our sincere thanks go to the Mechatronics System Design Laboratory for giving us a space to accomplish this paper. Appreciation goes to 5Dr. Muhammad Abu Eusuf for sharing his knowledge from the Environmental Engineering perspective.