Design of real time efficient sun tracking system for smart irrigation using raspberry pi

Agriculture is the root source of livelihood for about 60% of India's population. Agriculture in India still follows traditional way of farming. Modern Irrigation systems and modernization of farming systems has gained momentum over the past few decades. The main objective in this paper is to design a prototype of an efficient sun tracking system to make farming self-resilient of electricity supply and to automate irrigation systems such as soil watering and tank filling capabilities by using raspberry pi. The algorithm used for effective sun tracking is Astronomical Almanac's algorithm for approximate solar position which has 0.01 degrees accuracy in tracking the sun's position. The existing LDR based sun tracking system has a disadvantage that is external light source apart solar rays can influence measurements of sun position and thus lead to inaccurate measurement of sun position. The aforementioned issue is addressed in this paper by implementing the sun tracking part of the implementation by using solar azimuth angle equations and Astronomical Almanac's algorithm. The successful tracking the sun position thus can be used to develop a system than can be effectively used for irrigating the crops based on the soil moisture levels and monitoring water tank level for water conservation in the farm. The obtained efficiency of sun tracking system over the stationary system is 30.49%, the proposed system can give an efficiency of 40% when observed with the average difference obtained and monitored from data throughout the year.