File(s) under permanent embargo
Reason: This item is currently closed access.
Remote monitoring for wireless sensor-based irrigation system in Malawi
conference contribution
posted on 2017-10-17, 15:40 authored by Million T. Mafuta, Timothy Chadza, Harry S.H. Gombachika, Graham W. Ault, Damien F. Frame, Elijah BandaIn the recent years there has been an increase in the application of Wireless
Sensor Networks (WSNs) in agriculture, specifically aiding automatic application of water,
chemicals and fertilizers to the field. Since WSNs are still under development stage, they are
at times unreliable, power hungry, fragile and they easily lose communication. Intrinsically,
any irrigation system based on WSNs requires close monitoring to guard against any
horrendous mishaps. However, monitoring such an irrigation system which, usually, is
located at a rural site can be expensive and time consuming. In this paper we developed an
efficient, cost-effective and real-time wireless based remote monitoring mechanism for a
WSN based Irrigation system situated in Manja Township within Blantyre city. The system
archives data that include the soil moisture potential, link performance, electrical power
levels, and valve status and subsequently sends the information as a text message over a
cellular network to a remote monitoring site located at the Malawi Polytechnic. The remote
station has a broadband wireless dongle which is interfaced to a MYSQL database via an
open source FrontlineSMS. The information is graphically published on a web browser with
the help of a PHP script. Preliminary results demonstrate that a WSN based irrigation system
can be monitored remotely at a low cost and in real time.
Funding
The authors would like to thank the Community Rural Electrification and Development (CRED) project funded by the Scottish Government through the University of Strathclyde (UoS) for providing the equipment deployed in this projected in the city of Blantyre, Malawi.
History
School
- Mechanical, Electrical and Manufacturing Engineering
Published in
National Research Dissemination ConferenceCitation
MAFUTA, M. ... et al., 2012. Remote monitoring for wireless sensor-based irrigation system in Malawi. IN: Proceedings of 2012 National Commission for Science and Technology (NCST) National Research Dissemination Conference, Lilongwe, Malawi, 2 May 2012.Publisher
National Commission for Science and Technology (NCST)Version
- VoR (Version of Record)
Publisher statement
This work is made available according to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/Publication date
2012Publisher version
Language
- en