Feeding the world’s population despite limited resources is a task that requires ever more arable land and fresh water. Highly automated vertical farms could be the future of agriculture. Here the food is grown indoors so that the yield is free from pests, pathogens or bad weather. At the same time, this type of cultivation requires 95% less water, and fertilisers are used with exactly the right dose. There is no need for pesticides and other polluting substances in such systems. Another advantage of this type of cultivation is that vertical farms can be built in the direct vicinity of cities, which saves logistics costs and reduces CO2 emissions.
In an indoor farm, a large number of variables must be measured for the plant growth to be accurately controlled and to achieve a high degree of automation. On the basis of these measured values, the system can then be optimised to maximise crop yield. Modern vertical farms require a combination of hardware, automation, intelligent controllers and sensors. The process control and the data acquisition are becoming increasingly complex. A conventional system design requires a considerable amount of programming and integration. Each indoor farm has hundreds of I/O signals on its individual vertically stacked layers, which used to be routed back separately to the controller in the past. Accordingly, maintenance work, troubleshooting and the replacement of sensors are very time-consuming. ifm was able to help one indoor farm come up with better and smarter solutions.
A variety of different process sensors are used for indoor farms: flow meters for water and nutrient dosing, pressure sensors for the water level, conductivity to check the concentration of minerals, and sensors to control the pressure at the pumps. Connecting all sensors via IO-Link field modules reduces the complexity of the process control and makes more data available from each sensor, thus reducing the overall need for sensors.
Recipe changes and design adaptations, due to ongoing innovations, are easy to implement using digital communication. The entire setup process, from physical wiring to integration and programming, has thus become much more efficient.
With the help of IO-Link technology, it is now possible to standardise systems and individual modules so that vertical farms can be easily scaled, to implement future projects much more easily, while also accelerating setup.
As a technology partner, ifm can help improve the efficiency of vertical farms. Sensors from ifm can be used in the harvesting process, which is also automated − image processing, position sensors and RFID are just a few examples; and ifm can also provide high-level support.
The result for the indoor farm that ifm was involved with was that all relevant measured values for the indoor farm could be easily monitored, ensuring high product quality and less rejected produce. There was efficient connection of the sensors via IO-Link, and commissioning was faster and more efficient. With the technical support from ifm, the systems were scalable, and quick and easy to set up.
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