IoT and Edge For wateR Management (InTERiM)

Swiss partners

• HES-SO, HEPIA, Geneva: Nabil Abdennadher (main applicant)

• SixSq, Geneva: Marc-Elian Bégin 

Partners in the MENA region

• SUPCOM, Tunisia: Rached Hamza (main applicant)

• IPNET, Tunisia: Ali Benbrahim

• Institut National Agronomique de Tunis (INAT), Tunisia: Jamila Tarhouni

Presentation of the projet

The InTERiM project aims to address water management in the agricultural sector, in particular in vine fields. This project took place in two countries, Switzerland and Tunisia. Although the contexts are very different, the need to optimise water management remains the same. In Tunisia we observe a Mediterranean-type zone in the north and a sub-Saharan-type zone in the south. The water resources are rather complex and are characterized by a diversity of water resources used: surface water, groundwater, and treatment wastewater. These resources are mainly used for irrigation and, to a lesser degree, for the drinking water supply in rural areas of the region. The use of these resources is provided by a complex hydraulic network consisting of pumping stations, storage tanks, transfer and distribution canals and pipelines. In Switzerland, agriculture currently uses 70% of the water withdrawn from the environment. This use is in competition with other water uses: hydroelectricity, drinking and industrial water, etc. Water management is the responsibility of the municipalities and industrial services. This management is carried out today without a clear vision or real control of the quantities reserved for each use. However, this situation is not sustainable. It will be necessary, in the near future, to better supervise these uses in order to optimise them and to distribute this limited resource as well as possible.

In the future and in both cases (Switzerland and Tunisia), the limitation of water resources - particularly in relation to climate change - will exacerbate tensions and the question of the distribution of water flows and volumes become more important. Along the same lines, and in the case of vines, agronomists in Tunisia and Switzerland are interested in assessing the impact of different vegetation covers on vines. This impact is evaluated on the basis of temperature and humidity values in the air and in the soil. In fact, each type of cover has advantages and disadvantages that are known empirically, but have never been corroborated by scientific experimentation. The vegetation covers make the fields less susceptible to erosion as they reduce the harsh impact of raindrops, which reduces the amount of soil rain could potentially loosen.In addition to that, there is also some covers that may improve the soil environment for organisms that improve the soil quality. As there are benefits to vegetation covers there are also drawbacks.Indeed, poorly managed vegetation covers can behave like weeds, if left uncontrolled, compete for water, light and nutrients. Therefore, the advantageous use of vegetation requires monitoring and maintenance until the plants are effective. Water consumption is one of the points studied to justify the use of a given type of vegetation cover. Indeed, a rigorous cover consumes a lot of water and competes with the vines, which will not have enough water to grow. Soil moisture sensors are therefore installed at two different depths, in order to quantify the difference between each cover. According to agronomists, the cover used has an impact on the risk of frost. Some winegrowers prefer to use bare soil so that the heat stored during the day is radiated during the night. A temperature sensor is therefore installed at the vineyard level, about fifty centimetres above the ground, in order to be able to quantify the effect of radiation from the ground. Other points are also studied by agronomists, such as biodiversity, the richness of the soil and its protection (limiting erosion) or the quantity of herbicide used. But these are not measured by sensors in this project.

To carry out this project, low energy consumption sensors using the LoRa protocol have been installed. The data are retrieved and stored in a database and then represented in the form of graphs. Concretely speaking, he objectives of the InTERiM project are twofold:

• Deploy a set of temperature and moisture sensors at the scale of a vineyard in Tunis (INAT) and Switzerland (Bernex).
• Provide regular measurements to agronomists for their experimental purposes. In fact, These data will allow them to assess their assumptions related to the vegetation covers’ impact on the vines.