Smart Sensing for Greenhouse using Yuktix GreenSense

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Smart Sensing for Greenhouse 


Sensing play a important role in Farming, be it open field or closed environment like Greenhouse or Poly-house. You can read more about application of smart sensing in Agriculture in these blogs ( Part 1 and Part 2 ) and a whitepaper which we have published. Smart Sensing is application of sensors to measure the environmental variables like weather, soil, water which impact the activities during pre and post harvest in order to improve the productivity, production and reduce loss. While in open field agriculture, you cannot control the weather but only can take preventive measure, in a closed environment agriculture like Greenhouse, Poly-house you control the environment and make is suitable for the growth of plant like altering the temperature, humidity, soil moisture, CO2 content, Lux. Previously we have published couple of articles regarding how 

  1. What can be sensed in a Greenhouse i.e. environmental variables which impact the plant growth. 
  2. How sensors can be used to control the internal environment
  3. ROI related to use of sensing system in a Greenhouse. 
  4. Automatic Humidity Controller for a Greenhouse 
  5. How WSN ( wireless Sensor network ) can be used in a Greenhouse. 
In this article, i would like to cover more on how Yuktix GreenSense can be used in Greenhouse for monitoring and control, its features and how it is different from simple logger based system.


Yuktix GreenSense - For Greenhouse 

GreenSense is a next generation Solar powered ( with battery back-up )  wireless device which allow you to measure important environmental variables using sensors like 


which impact the growth of the crops growing in Greenhouse or poly-house. And all this in real time, from multiple location over a single dashboard. You can either deploy a 

  • A single device in a big chamber inside Greenhouse or poly-house ( if it has only 1 chamber just like one growing roses ) using GPRS communication 


  • Multiple devices inside a big chamber to cover more hyper-local and accurate data using Sub-GHz wireless communication 

Features 
  1. Power - Solar powered with battery back-up making it work 24x7 without interruption 
  2. Sensors - Out of box comes with Temperature, Humidity and Soil moisture sensor. Extra sensors like Lux, CO2 and Leaf wetness can be provided on request. 
  3. Wireless - Next generation low power long range wireless solution. Drop and deploy ad-hoc networks. 
  4. Reports - Generate daily, weekly and monthly reports with useful insights and actionable data.
  5. Dashboard - Access data from different sensors from different location using a single dashboard. Interactive visualization to see the trend of data i.e. how it is varying, does mysting help reduce the temperature and increase humidity, is irrigation is being efficiently. 
  6. Alerts - get notified when any variables reading goes beyond a range using SMS or Email ( whatsapp integration in future ). 
  7.  Download data for future reference. 

How it works 

Yuktix GreenSense is developed on top of Yuktix ankiDB (Yuktix Internet of Things Platform ) which include ankiDB™ micro ( Hardware, firmware and communication )  and ankiDB™ cloud  ( device, data management software, computation and alert engine ). Yuktix GreenSense use SKU023-V3 version of our hardware which is a low power device with on-board Solar charger and BMS ( battery management system ). It allow us to interface different sensor using GreenSense card and use different communication options like GPRS ( in case of single device ) or Sub-GHz ( Xbee or LoRa - in case of multiple devices ). Data is collected by different sensors by Yuktix GreenSense and pushed to Yuktix solar powered gateway which use GPRS to push it to cloud. Once data is received by Yuktix ankiDB cloud, its stored in a time-series data based which is then analyzed, outliers are removed by our computation engine and different computations are run. The analyzed data is then made available to the user using our GreenSense dashboard. Below are few examples of Yuktix GreenSense dashboard displaying data from multiple devices of a Greenhouse. 





How it is different from generalized loggers

  1. Most of the generalized loggers are DC 12V powered (which GreenSense also is ). But Yuktix GreenSense is one in all. It can be powered either via 12V DC or Solar + battery combination.
  2. Most of the loggers use GPRS as communication option. For 1 device it is fine, but for 10 devices maintaining 10 sims can be difficult. In these case Yuktix provide ad-hoc networking where GreenSense device communicate wireless to a gateway using WSN.
  3. Most of the loggers provide Temperature, Humidity or CO2. Yuktix GreenSense allow you to measure other crucial variables like Leaf Wetness, Soil moisture ( multiple depth ), Lux.
  4. Web-dashboard - Yuktix GreenSense provide better visualization, reporting and data sharing with a distributed team. Get notified via SMS or email in real time. 
  5. Integrate Weather forecast for the location in the same dashboard and take more informative decisions. 
  6. We also provide NABL certified sensors on request. Other sensor used are high quality research grade sensor with high precision and accuracy. You can visit this link to know more about specification of individual sensors. 

Who can use it?
  1. Greenhouse Manufacturers 
  2. Greenhouse Management companies 
  3. Greenhouse owners who have multiple greenhouse located in different locations 
  4. Poly-house or Greenhouse Service companies
  5. Nurseries 
  6. Hydroponic companies 

Case Studies
  1. Deployment in Dragon Fruit Greenhouse for Agriculture Research Institute
  2. Deployment in a Rose Greenhouse.  
  3. Deployment in a Gerbera Greenhouse.



Please feel free to contact us if you think you can use this product either in your Greenhouse or Poly-house or as a part of your offering. Also, if you are looking for application of Smart Sensing or in more generalized terms IoT ( Internet of Things ) in agriculture, please feel free to reach out to us using this link and our experts will get back to you. 


Happy Farming 

Location: Bengaluru, Karnataka, India

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