I Case study
By: Abdulaziz Youssef Kharouf ICON - Intelligent Consult Consultant Engineers®
Irrigation Scheduling and Saving Introduction Innovative irrigation practices are becoming more essential considering the rapid technological advancements and environmental resources strains elevating the necessity of breeding innovation to enhance water use efficiency, gain an economic advantage and reduce environmental burdens. Innovative measures can often be as simple as applying or re-applying the basic principles effectively. In this case study, we will explore the irrigation water saving achieved by merely re-visiting/re-scheduling the existing irrigation controller schedules of an automatic irrigation system serving a large private plot’s landscape in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates without any other modifications on the existing irrigation network/system (zero cost intervention). According to the results, irrigation water saving of around 20% was achieved by only adjusting and optimizing the irrigation schedules. Implementation A study worth mentioning in this context by Cooley et al. (2009) compiled a list of currently available options for “improving the efficiency of water use in California
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agriculture”, and pointed out that all solutions fall under one of three categories: efficient irrigation technologies, improved irrigation scheduling, or regulated deficit irrigation, where the category with the largest potential for water savings is improving irrigation scheduling. In this case study’s project, a survey was conducted on the existing irrigation and landscape assets to identify existing system’s condition and problems with the irrigation system that reduces performance and overall irrigation efficiency. All the existing irrigation assets were surveyed and assessed including the supply source, tanks, pumps, lines, valves, controllers, irrigation devices, meters and soil condition. A full report was produced with the assessment and recommendation of simple cost-effective interventions that can be applied to improve the efficiency of the system element. As a first step, it was decided to only implement improvements on the irrigation schedule to assess the achievable water saving from that intervention alone. Regarding the existing irrigation schedules, it was found that they were a mix of multiple timings and were not consistent. Manual irrigation instances were
