Automated Irrigation System Guided By Evapotranspiration Compensation

Abstract

The rapid growth of the world's population drives an increasing demand for food, highlighting Malthus's prediction about the unsustainability of population growth in the face of food production. Given the projection of almost nine billion people by 2050, optimizing agricultural production becomes crucial, with irrigation emerging as a key method to increase crop efficiency. This study proposes the development of an automated irrigation system based on evapotranspiration compensation, aiming to address this challenge by promoting sustainable water use and improving agricultural productivity. The system was developed using the Penman-Monteith method (FAO) and applied to curly lettuce cultivation, with a control module equipped with an ESP32 microcontroller to calculate evapotranspiration and manage irrigation based on real-time atmospheric data.