A WIRELESS DESIGN OF LOW-COST IRRIGATION SYSTEM USING ZIGBEE TECHNOLOGY

2009 International Conference on Networks Security, Wireless Communications and Trusted Computing

IEEE Abstract: At present, labor-saving and water-saving technology is a key issue in irrigation. A wireless solution for intelligent field irrigation system dedicated to Jew's-ear planting in Lishui, Zhejiang, China, based on ZigBee technology was proposed in this paper. Instead of conventional wired connection, the wireless design made the system easy installation and maintenance. The hardware architecture and software algorithm of wireless sensor/actuator node and portable controller, acting as the end device and coordinator in ZigBee wireless sensor network respectively, were elaborated in detail. The performance of the whole system was evaluated in the end. The long-time smooth and proper running of the system in the field proved its high reliability and practicability. As an explorative application of wireless sensor network in irrigation management, this paper offered a methodology to establish large-scale remote intelligent irrigation system. INTRODUCTION: People now are working actively at intelligent irrigation systems because their advantages of labor-saving and water saving. Wireless technology, known for its easy installation and maintenance, is thought preponderant to develop automatic irrigation network and becoming a hot research. Shock et al. (1999) used radio transmission for soil moisture data from data loggers to a central computer logging Site. Zhao et al. (2007) designed an irrigation system for city greenbelt adopting moisture sensor, wireless communication and RS-485 bus to achieve remote control and distributed control. Kim et al. (2008) presented an integrated distributed wireless sensor network that utilizes Bluetooth technology for sensor-based variable rate irrigation systems.

METHOD: The system consists of a portable controller, a wireless sensor node, a weather station and several wireless actuators. The sensor node collects the temperature and air humidity parameters in its section, whereas the nearby weather station monitors the meteorological information indicating if it rains. All the sensory data are wirelessly sent to the portable controller. The in-field actuator nodes are used to control the pump and electromagnetic valves when receive the control commands wirelessly transmitted from the portable controller. Both sensor node and actuator node serve as end devices in the wireless network, composing the WSN together with the portable controller which acts as the coordinator in ZigBee protocol to build and maintain the wireless sensor network and meanwhile manage the irrigation system.

HARDWARE & SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS:

Hardware components: PIC 16F877A, 2x16-LCD, RS232, 2.4GHz ZigBee module, PC

interface, temperature and Humidity sensors, electromagnetic valves.

Software tools: Development tool MPLAB IDE v7.42, Hardware Compiler - HI-Tech

PIC C, Debugger cum programmer ICD II, Hardware Simulation tool - Proteus v6.9 Sp4

SYSTEM DESIGN Wireless Sensor & Actuator Node (ZigBee End Device)

Temperature sensor Irrigation Plant Humidity sensor Electromagnetic Valves Signal Conditioning IEEE 802.15.4 WPAN protocol

Water Pumps

Actuator

PIC Microcontroller with 10-BIT ADC

Portable Controller (ZigBee Coordinator)

INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDER

IEEE 802.15.4 WPAN protocol

PC PIC Microcontroller