Monitoring and control system for an indoor cannabis cultivation

Abstract

Indoor cultivation is widely used due to its advantages for growing plants in a controlled environment. In this method, the necessary elements for plant growth are artificially managed. In Uruguay, several ventures have emerged applying this cultivation technique since the approval of the law that regulates cannabis production. Like any production process, indoor cultivation presents various technological challenges aimed at optimizing its performance.

This paper presents the results obtained in the development of a monitoring and control system applied to an indoor cannabis greenhouse. It includes the analysis carried out to identify the relevant variables to be monitored and the selection of processes to be controlled. Furthermore, the development of a wireless network is described, consisting of a series of sensors for different variables and a set of distributed actuators. These components record the process variables and provide information that is stored in a database and visualized through a user interface. The monitored variables include soil humidity and temperature, ambient humidity and temperature, CO2 concentration, light level, and water pH level.

The network is composed of a supervisory computer with internet connection and distributed units. There are two types of distributed units: Distributed Control Units (DCUs) and Pot Nodes (PNs). These elements work with System-on-Chip modules, with a radio link that allows communications following the IEEE 802.15.4 standard. They use the Contiki-NG operating system, designed to implement a 6LoWPAN wireless communication network, and utilize the CoAP protocol at the application layer.

We hope that this work contributes to the development of distributed monitoring and control systems applied to agroindustry.