Testing Novel New Drip Emitter with Variable Diameters for a Variable Rate Drip Irrigation

Abstract

This research presents a new variable rate drip irrigation (VRDI) emitter design that can monitor individual water drops. Conventional drip systems cannot monitor the individual water flow rate per emitter. Application uniformity for conventional drip emitters can be decreased by clogged emitters, irregular emitter orifices, and decreases in pressure. A VRDI emitter can overcome the irrigation challenges in the field by increasing water application uniformity for each plant and reducing water losses. Flow rate is affected by the diameter of the delivery pipe and the pressure of the irrigation delivery system. This study compares the volumetric water flow rate for conventional drip emitters and new VRDI emitters with variable diameters inner (1 mm, 1.2 mm, 1.4 mm, and 1.6 mm) and outside (3 mm, 3.5 mm, 4 mm, and 4.5 mm) with three pressures (34 kPa, 69 kPa, and 103 kPa). The tests revealed that the new VRDI emitter had flow rates that increased as the operating pressure increased similar to a conventional drip tube. The flow rate was slightly increased in the VRDI with pressure, but even this increase did not show large changes in the flow rate. The flow rate of the conventional drip tube was 88% larger than the VRDI emitter for all pressures (p < 0.05). However, operating pressure did not affect the drop sizes at the VRDI emitter, but the generalized linear mixed models (GLM) results show that volume per drop was impacted by the outside diameter of the VRDI outlet (p < 0.05). The interaction between the inner and outside diameter was also significant at p < 0.01, and the interaction between outside diameter and pressure was statistically significant at p < 0.01. The electronic components used to control our VRDI emitter are readily compatible with off-the-shelf data telemetry solutions; thus, each emitter could be controlled remotely and relay data to a centralized data repository or decision-maker, and a plurality of these emitters could be used to enable full-field scale VRDI.

Simulation of the flow characteristics of a labyrinth milli-channel used in drip irrigation

“…In general, the structure of the emitters in drip irrigation systems is complex and characterised by a small size flow path ranging from 0.2 to 1.2 mm (Al-agele et al, 2021). Thus, clogging can occur when the irrigation water used contains particles or microorganisms.…”

Exploring innovation adoption behavior for sustainable development of Mediterranean tree crops

“…In contrast, precision irrigation pursues the objective of adapting water supplies to actual crop needs on a small scale (Fernández et al, 2019;Jiménez et al, 2022). Precision irrigation is still underused (Al-Agele et al, 2021a;Beyá-Marshall et al, 2022), but farmer interest is high and would be rapidly implemented if supported by adequate technical dissemination entrusted to new professional figures (Bwambale et al, 2022;Silva et al, 2022).…”

A Pathway for Sustainable Agriculture

“…New irrigation technologies designed to increase application efficiency have been patented [25] and demonstrated. Two examples are a new dynamic elevation spray application (DESA) for overhead irrigation systems that responds to the growth of the crop canopy [26], and a variable rate drip irrigation (VRDI) emitter that can be used to customize water irrigation amounts and timings to individual plants [27].…”