PROJECT DESCRIPTION
BACKGROUND
Climate change causes extreme weather fluctuations, leading to longer periods of drought on one hand and overflow of watercourses on the other. In Europe, while the north is getting significantly wetter and prone to winter floods, the Mediterranean and other parts of southern and central Europe are seeing more frequent heatwaves, wildfires and droughts. This will significantly disrupt agriculture, which depends on certain temperatures and precipitation levels. In tandem, agriculture represents the single largest share of total freshwater abstraction in the EU; in Greece, Italy, Portugal, Cyprus, Spain and southern France it can reach 80%. Farming choices and the climate determine the water footprint of agriculture. Over-exploitation of water resources is a threat to both farming and the environment. Thus, crop irrigation is an area where new practices and policies can have a substantial impact on improving water use efficiency. Moreover, agriculture not only has impacts on water resources in terms of quantity (volumes of water used), but also in terms of quality. Namely, agricultural soils can be contaminated with a wide range of compounds applied as pesticides and fertilizers. There is a tendency to over-irrigate and fertilize, 'just in case'. However, in addition to impacting the environment, this is not necessarily good for crops, as they are most productive in a specific range of humidity and nutrient conditions, and excessive irrigation and/or fertilization can decrease productivity.
OBJECTIVES
The main objective of the LIFE HYDROSTICK project is to make precision farming easy and accessible by means of a new Internet of the Things (IoT) solution. The project team will demonstrate at real scale how this solution, involving modular wireless sensors, allows real-time monitoring of soil data, including water content and availability, pH, and nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) levels, to increase sustainability and productivity in the agro-industry sector.
RESULTS
Expected results:
- Demonstration and validation of a novel soil and crop monitoring solution for agriculture capable of measuring water content, water availability, temperature, NPK and pH, among other parameters, at different depths, to help optimise irrigation and fertigation practices and achieve water savings.
- Demonstration of the benefits of using this modular solution instead of current systems based on individual sensors.
- Improved knowledge of the dynamics of nutrients in the soil at different soil depths, and how this effects irrigation and fertigation needs, and enables the measurement of the amount of wasted resources below the roots of the crop.
- Reduced consumption of water by up to 30% as a result of an optimised monitoring and irrigation management practice, as compared with currently used solutions.
- Reduced costs of water irrigation of crops by 30% as a result of both reducing the cost of water and the energy consumption of the irrigation systems’ pumps.
- Reduction of 25%, on average, of the consumption of fertilizers (either alone or in fertigation) that will also contribute to reducing the emissions of nitrogenous greenhouse gases such as nitrous oxide (N2O).
- Reduction of 25% in the equivalent carbon emissions due to irrigation and fertilization.
- Increased productivity of the selected crops (€/tonnes year) in comparison with current sensoring and irrigation management tools, by at least an average of 25%.
- Reduction of 70% in the time needed for the installation, operation and maintenance of sensoring and monitoring tools in crops.
- Inclusion of the HYDROSTICK solution as a best practice in the sector, both for organic agriculture and agriculture using fertilizers.
- Demonstratration of a useful life of the HYDROSTICK system of 5 years, without the occurrence of degradation of the sensoring packs.
- Development of an efficient and user-friendly methodology for the installation and set-up of the HYDROSTICK.
- Replication and transfer of project results to more than 1 080 ha before project ends (i.e. 1% of irrigated areas in Navarra, Spain).
- Increased awareness at all value chain levels (including civil society and public authorities) of the project’s new technological solution.
