International Journal of Engineering Technology, Management and Applied Sciences

www.ijetmas.com June 2017, Volume 5, Issue 6, ISSN 2349-4476

Automated Irrigation System with Weather Forecast

Integration

Amarjit Malhotra1, Sumit Saini2, Vatsala Vasant Kale3

1
Assistant Professor, Department of Information Technology, NSIT (Delhi University)
2, 3
UG Student, Department of Information Technology, NSIT (Delhi University)

Abstract— The population of India has reached 130
crore and is still increasing. There lays a serious
problem ahead us in near future. Traditional methods
will fail to supply food and the supply will be same but
demand will keep increasing. It is high time to equip
farmers with modern technology which will increase
quality and quantity of yield. The main objective of this
paper is to automate the irrigation process helping
farmers and the nation as a whole. Intruder attacks on
fields are responsible for thrashing of huge amount of
crops. Also, It is seen that people often forget to water
their plants, let it be due to forgetfulness or due to the
reason that they are away from home. The human
involvement is minimized with the use of temperature and
soil moisture sensor. The real time readings of sensors
are used by the microcontroller, which automates the
whole irrigation process.
user to have adequate knowledge of the crops or
plants. This limited the system from being used by
everyone who is in the need of it. This was
countered by built-in data in the system with a wide
variety of plants, crops ,vegetables enabling the
system to beeasily used by anyone with just
selecting the type of crop he or she is planting.
Since the system is meant to be self sufficient, it
should not require the attention of the user too
frequently and it should be able to inform the user if
there is any kind of threat to the system like an
intruder or animal damaging the crop. This self
sufficiency was implemented in the system by
adding a infrared sensor which would detect any
kind of physical intrusion and immediately
informing the user through the E-mail notification.

I. INTRODUCTION II. SENSOR UNIT

Currently systems exist in this domain ranging from
GSM-GSM system pair module to specifically
tailored systems used for a particular type of crop or
vegetation. A lot of these systems use the concept of
a microcontroller overhead managing the system
with slight variations depending on the specific
need catered by the project. However, it was noted
that none of these systems were using the current
technology to its maximum potential, that is
extending the system with a forecasting unit in
order to foresee the future weather, this integration
can help to reduce the risk of over irrigation or
wastage of water by surface run off which can
further ruin the crops. Also, depending on the
temperature and humidity a crop may need more or
less water than usually needed for its optimum
growth. This optimization can only be implemented
by integrating a weather forecasting unit into the
system .Secondly, a lot of these systems require the
For developing an efficient system of
plantationmanagement, the foremost input is the
availability of accurate data. This data includes soil
properties, agronomic data, physicochemical
parameters, atmospheric data, etc, preferably on a
day-to-day basis or even hourly basis. Normal
laboratory analysis of these parameters and manual
decision-making take a long time even with the
most sophisticated analytical techniques.
Resistance Humidity Detector (RHD) was used to
measure capacitance value of the soil and
corresponding moisture value were correlated. RHD
was used since it is sensitive to even minute
changes in the resistance value of the soil even
when for a narrow span of difference and when
moisture values were needed to be measured on an
hourly basis.
Monitoring of physical and environmental

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 International Journal of Engineering Technology, Management and Applied Sciences
www.ijetmas.com June 2017, Volume 5, Issue 6, ISSN 2349-4476
parameters including soil moisture, relative
humidity, air temperature, rainfall, vapor pressure
and sunshine hours is done through integrating the
sensor unit with the forecast unit. The forecast unit
uses Yahoo API which is connected to the system
using NodeMCU, an open source IoT platform
acting as a wifi-enabler to the system. NodeMCU is
controlled by Arduino Uno which requests for
weather information from the server. This
information along with the Sensor readings is
III. CONTROL UNIT
Control Unit uses external instruments in the system
and facilitates the desired working of the system.
The system is controlled by the Arduino and Node
MCU. The core component of the Arduino is
ATmega328P micro controller. The Arduino
controls the water pump based on the reading from
the moisture sensor. Arduino starts working only
when it gets signal from node MCU. Node MCU
sends a notification after detecting change in plant’s
surrounding through pir sensor. Node MCU sends
the weather information of the plant's location to the
user. It gets signals from the Blynk app and sends
them to Arduino. Node MCU also forwards the
system status information to Blynk app. In this way,
it provides a two-way communication channel
between the hardware and App. The circuit board
provides power to various components of the system.
Node MCU’s core module component is esp8266
which provides wireless communication capabilities.
Node MCU uses different LEDs to show it’s current
status. Both Arduino and Node MCU can be
programmed in arduino IDE which uses C++. Serial
monitor is used to see the code being executed in
Arduino or Node MCU.
The Moisture sensor measures the resistance of the
soil. It creates an electric potential between the soil
and then measures the current flowing through the
potential difference. Using ohm's law, it calculates
the resistance of the soil. But, even the soil with
water in it has very high resistance. The resistance of
the soil is far higher than any other electric
component resistance. So, 1 Mega resistor is
connected so that high resistance can be measured.
One end of 1 Mega ohm resistor is connected to the
ground and other end to one of the sensor's wire.
This same sensor wire gives the reading to the
180 Amarjit Malhotra, Sumit Saini, Vatsala Vasant Kale
processed and sent to the user.
It is a comprehensive system that integrates sensing
, wireless and processing technologies and is
capable of sensing and gathering different physical
parameters without loss in the sensing accuracy.
The parameters are processed and wirelessly
transmitted to a centralised data storage system
through a gateway from where they may be
remotely accessed and analysed by the user.
arduino. Other wire of the sensor is connected to the
10-kilo ohm resistor which in turn is connected to
the 5v supply. The aim of using a 10-kilo ohm
resistor here is to reduce the range of the current, one
is measuring across a given potential difference. It is
a current limiting resistor. It increases the range of
the resistance that can be measured through sensor.
As in ohm's law, current and resistance are inversely
proportional.
Voltage Divider
A voltage divider involves applying a voltage source
across a series of two resistors. You may see it
drawn in a few different ways, but they should
always be the same circuit. Let's call the resistor
closest to the input voltage (Vin) R1, and the resistor
closest to ground R2. The voltage drop across R2 is
called Vout, that’s the divided voltage our circuit
exists to make. That’s all there is to the circuit! Vout
is our divided voltage. That’s what’ll end up being a
fraction of the input voltage.
It turns out voltage is easy for microcontrollers, by
adding another resistor to the resistive sensors, we
can create a voltage divider. Once the output of the
voltage divider is known, we can go back and
calculate the resistance of the sensor.
In the above equation, R1 is the resistance of the soil
which is very high. R2 has to be very high compared
to the R1 to get a good range of voltage for the
different resistances of the soil.
Voltage Regulator
As all the components in the circuit needs a 5v
source. It converts 12v from the adapter to output a
fixed voltage of 5v and fixed output current is 1.5
 International Journal of Engineering Technology, Management and Applied Sciences

www.ijetmas.com June 2017, Volume 5, Issue 6, ISSN 2349-4476

amp. It has three pins one for the ground, one for between each reading. Store these values in
12v input and one for 5v output. readings1 array and store the sum in the total1
Transistor variable.
The transistor acts as a switch for water pump. It has 3.1 Take the average, and save it in sensorValue1 =
one end connected to the ground, one to the total1 / numReadings.
arduino’s digital pin 6, and one to the ground of the 4. Read the value of input1 pin
water pump. Water pump is positive terminal is if( input1 == HIGH )
provided with 12v supply. As arduino cannot power
{
the water pump with its 5v .A transistor is used to do
it and to switch motor on or off through Arduino. if ( sensorValue1 < threshold )
Analog pin 1 is assigned the value A0. The aim of {
using this variable is to set the analog pin A0 as switch on the water pump by writing the high to
input pin. This pin reads the input from the moisture pump1
sensor. As it a analog pin it can read values from 0- indicate that motor is on to app by writing the high
1023, this would indicate moisture or water present to output2
in the soil. }
Input1 is assigned the value 3.Again, the aim of if(sensorValue1 > threshold1)
using this variable is to set the digital pin 3 as input
pin. This pin reads the input from the Blynk app. As {
it is a digital pin it can read either 0 or 1. Mcu would switch off the water pump by writing the low to
act as an intermediary between Arduino and app. pump1
indicate that motor is off to app by writing the low
to output2
}
}
else
{
keep the motor off by writing the low to pump1
keep indicating that motor is off to app by writing
the low to output2
}
give a delay of 500 milliseconds before reading
again
Fig. 1 Components Assembled The analogpin1 should be read after a delay of few
milliseconds so that there is some change in values.
IV. ALGORIHM Once average is calculated, a delay of about 500
1. Initialize the variables, analogPin1 = A0, input1 = milliseconds would help to give a different value
3, output2 =6, pump1 =9 sensorValue1 = 0, than that from the last calculated value. Pump
numReadings = 10 and total1 =0. section of algorithm is only entered when the user
allows so.
2. In setup, set pinmode for input1 as input and
pinmode of output2 as output and pumppin1 as Algorithm for Node MCU
output. 1 Initialization
2.1 Initialize the readings array with 0. 1.1 Set auth to token received from blynk app. Set
ssid and pass to wifi name and password. Set
3 In loop , read numReadings (10) consecuitive
moisture values, account in a delay of 5 milliseconds forecastApiKey to key received from server. Set

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 International Journal of Engineering Technology, Management and Applied Sciences

www.ijetmas.com June 2017, Volume 5, Issue 6, ISSN 2349-4476

latitide and longitude to the home location. Make a V. TESTING AND RESULTS
simple Timer object 'timer'. Make Testing the working of Sensors
2 Define weather_info function Moisture Sensor
2.1 write High to digital pin h, indicating through led Consistent readings of a home potted spinach plant
that weather message is being sent. were taken in order to:
2.2 Call updateWeatherData function on weather 1.Ensure the correct working of the sensors by
object to update class's object member variables. measuring the moisture value variation detected by
2.3 Use different getter functions and store the the sensors when the soil is subjected to adequate
returned data in the temp, humidity and other watering, minimal watering, excessive watering or
variables. no watering at all.
2.4 Add these variables into a string named toprint. 2.Collecting the data for one specific plant so as to
Use json like formatting. determine the corresponding optimum watering of
2.5 call email fucntion on blynk object. First the plant depending on its phase of growth, this data
parameter is sender's address, second is subject, third once stored into the system will free the user from
is body. Use toprint as third parameter. the hassle of knowing the exact amount a plant
needs, also it would widen the usage of the system to
2.6 write Lowto digital pin h, indicating through led
users who do not posses knowledge about
that weather message has been sent.
farming/gardening yet want to use the system.
3. In setup, use pinmode to set f, g as input pins and
Following is a graph showing temperature and
h, i as output pins.
Moisture variation of a plant throughout a day:
3.1 Connect to wifi using begin function on blynk
object.
3.2 Call weather_info function
3.3 Use timer object and call set interval function in
which first parameter is time interval and second
parameter is name of function to call.
4. In loop, add Blynk.run function and timer.run
function.
4.1 Read the digital pin f. If it is high then turn the
led of app on else turn it off. This indicates status of
water pump in app.
4.2 Set pir to 0.
4.3 Take 100 consecuitive pir sensor readings and
take their take.
4.4 Store this average in pir.
4.5 If this average reading is high then send intruder Fig. 1
attack mail to the user and swich on the led at pin i. Representation of moisture
Delay for 10 minutes to avoid spamming the user.
Soil having abundant water would have very high
What is required conductivity. As water level drops conductivity
The sysytem sends weather information around drops indicating a drop in the moisture level. Sensor
plants to user after a fixed interval. User can look up reads in 10 bits so range is 0 to 1024.
the information and decide whether to give water to Choosing Optimum time for watering
plants. Example, if it is going to rain in noon then
1.Adding water at night would mean waterlogging
there is no point of watering in morning. Also, it
for most part of the day. As there would be no
detects intrusion and sends notification to user.
sunlight to photosynthesize and use water.

182 Amarjit Malhotra, Sumit Saini, Vatsala Vasant Kale

 International Journal of Engineering Technology, Management and Applied Sciences

www.ijetmas.com June 2017, Volume 5, Issue 6, ISSN 2349-4476

2.Adding water at noon means water would get hot A n E-Mail notification is sent to the user regarding
and this hot water on reaching roots would damage the current weather condition around the plants or
them. crops:
Working of the API and Notification Mechanism
System was tested for informing the user of the
current moisture levels and also for the working of
weather forecast information to be provided to the
user.

Fig. 3 Screenshot of Email Notification

Testing the Intruder Detection System
The system was tested for correct functioning of the
IR Sensor. System was checked both indoor and
outdoors. When the vicinity of the system was posed
with any kind of intruder, the system detected the
intrusion and sent a notification mail to the user

Fig.2 Application Interface showing the motor value

to be off since moisture value is above threshold
Fig 4 Screenshot of Intrusion Notification

183 Amarjit Malhotra, Sumit Saini, Vatsala Vasant Kale

 International Journal of Engineering Technology, Management and Applied Sciences
www.ijetmas.com June 2017, Volume 5, Issue 6, ISSN 2349-4476
Then sink node sends the stored values to monitoring
station. On the basis of water level information, the
switch is on/off.
VI. CONCLUSION
We aimed at developing a system which would
tackle the inefficiency and hassle associated with a
man-driven irrigation land or even a garden. While
trying to develop such a system it was a process of
learning and we kept on transitioning to a system
closer to what we envisioned.
The main aim of the project was to develop such a
system which would facilitate any farmer/gardener
to provide the best possible nourishment to the crops
or plants and minimize any risk of overirrigation or
underirrigation with the added benefit of saving
water from being misused.
Also, we envisioned our system to be such that even
a layman should be able to make the use of the
system, this we achieved by feeding pre determined
data to the system and letting the system decide
whether the plant or crop needs watering or not.
We also integrated an IR sensor to save the plants or
crops from any possible damage by animals, this
integration also helped the use to be at a greater
sense of peace while he or she is away from the
place where the system is situated.
A Cost Efficient System
In our study we saw some systems which were made
on RaspberryPi as a platform, However the systems
thus produced had high deployment cost and cost of
maintenance increased every year. Following shows
the cost effectiveness of the project:
184 Amarjit Malhotra, Sumit Saini, Vatsala Vasant Kale
VII FUTURE WORK
Crops have always been threatened by pests which
cause extreme harm and ultimately lead to complete
destruction of the farm. This leads to loss of not only
the crops but all the effort, time and money put in by
the farmers throughout the year. Any detection
mechanism if developed to immediately alert the
farmer if any part of his field is infected by pests
would be a much needed development in this sector.
In today’s world, Humans have every facility,
technology, knowledge to shape the world better but
efforts are needed to be made to expand the horizons
of knowledge and integrate the different domains to
achieve bigger.
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[2]. Karan Kansara; Vishal Zaveri; Shreyans Shah; Sandip
Delwadkar; Kaushal Jani “Sensor based Automated
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