ECRB 412 FINAL YEAR PROJECT 1 SEM 2 2011/12

Title: Automated Nutrient and Lighting Control in Hydroponics System Authors Name: Afifah bte Yusuf (EE081508) Supervisors Name: Ir. Dr. Chong Kok Hen Date: 14th October 2011

Table of Contents 1.0 Introduction 2.0 Literature Review 3.0 Objectives 4.0 Project Details 4.1 Methodology 4.2 Tools 5.0 Gantt chart 6.0 Conclusion 7.0 Resources 8.0 List of References 9.0 Appendices 3 3 3 3

4 4 4 4 5

1.0 Introduction
[1]

Hydroponics is a method of growing plants using mineral nutrient solutions, in water, without soil. There are various techniques of implementing hydroponics however; the focus of this project is on the continuous-flow solution culture where the nutrient solution will constantly flow past the roots. The timely delivery of nutrient solutions is crucial to the health of hydroponic plants. Hand watering requires the gardener to be available for routine watering several times a day. Therefore, Nutrient Film Technique (NFT) has been introduced. However, the NFT are vulnerable to problems with electrical outages or pump failures. About the lighting, some of gardener use only sunlight while others use artificial light. If only sunlight is used, whenever it is cloudy, the plant will not be getting sufficient light while if only artificial light is used, the consumption of energy is high. 2.0 Literature Review In hydroponics, the timely delivery of nutrient solutions is crucial to the health of hydroponic plants. [2]Hand watering requires the gardener to be available for routine watering several times a day. Systems depending on pumps are vulnerable to problems with electrical outages or pump failures. The installation of backup power supplies and constant monitoring of pumps is an expensive solution to this problem. For the small gardener this can be a problem. In this project a hydroponics system with low energy consumption will be designed. The cost also will be minimized. Why would go for hydroponics? Since hydroponics system does not use soil as a medium, it will not be exposed to radioactive effect. In soil for example, mined phosphate may contain excessive amounts of fluoride, good for teeth in very small quantities, but harmful to humans in excess. Mined phosphate also can contain small amounts of radioactive elements such as radium, which releases radon, also not good for human health. Eventually, we would like to minimize the radioactive effect to our body since our country will build nuclear power plant in the future which will also brings the radioactive effect to our body. 3.0 Objectives This project is focusing on implementation of engineering in agriculture. The learning objectives of this project are: To build a hydroponics system for plantation To construct a control module for the hydroponics system To develop a control software for the hydroponics control module

This project will develop an easy way to grow organic vegetables which are healthier. Therefore, everyone can grow their own food. 4.0 Project Details 4.1 Methodology 4.1.1 Control the brightness of the artificial light to provide sufficient light depending on the natural light. Control the nutrient flow and maintain the water level. 4.1.2 Preventing pump from any damages for a long term usage. 4.1.3 Designing a project that consumer can easily operate and understand it.

Timer to control the flow of nutrient into the medium(water) Artificial lighting and sensor in order to provide sufficient light; when natural light (The Sun) is dimmed, the artificial light will be turned on accordingly. 4.2.3 Water level sensor will be used to maintain water level in the box. 4.2.4 PIC Microcontroller will be used to program each specification. 4.2.5 Research will be done to make the pump can be used in long term time. 5.0 Gantt Chart for FYP1 Activities 2 1. Hardware and process design 2. Literature review (components, devices, equipment, tools) 3. Component purchasing 4. Hardware construction 5. Software development 6. Title proposal 7. Project proposal 8. Progress report 1 9. Progress report 2 10. Logbook 11. Oral presentation 3 4 5 6 7 8 Week 9 10 11 12 13 14

4.2 Tools 4.2.1 4.2.2

6.0 Conclusion Automated nutrient and lighting control in hydroponics system will be major help to human. Besides of the benefit of the hydroponic plant itself, this project will make everyone can grow organics plant themselves with lower cost and lower management. This is an easy way to lead a healthy life. This project will majorly used PIC Microcontroller to design it. 7.0 Resources Process Control Instrumentation Technology Eight Edition, Curtis D. Johnson. 8.0 List of references 1. Hydroponics; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroponics 2. Problem With Hydroponics; http://www.gardenguides.com/104056-problemshydroponics.html

9.0 Appendix

Figure1: Lighting sensor circuit

Figure2: Water level circuit

Figure3: Simple hydroponics system diagram