Australian Journal of Engineering Research

ISSN: 2203-9465 (Print) ISSN: 2203-9473 (Online)

An Automated Greenhouse Control System Using Arduino

Prototyping Platform
Jonathan A. Enokela (Corresponding Author)
Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Federal University of Agriculture,
P.M.B. 2373, Makurdi, Benue State, Nigeria
Tel: +2347031867444
Email: jonajapeno@gmail.com

Theophilus O. Othoigbe
Department of Works & Logistics (Electrical), Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, National
Headquarters, Abuja, Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria
Tel: +2348035683490
Email: oremumena@gmail.com

Abstract

The world climate change has brought about unpredictable weather conditions that have resulted in the
global food shortage being experienced. A possible solution to this problem will likely involve
households growing a reasonable percentage of the vegetables and crops they need in a greenhouse which
does not require too much land space. A greenhouse will normally produce more crops per square meter
when compared to open field cultivation since the microclimatic parameters that determine crop yield
are continuously monitored and controlled to ensure that an optimum environment is created. The
automated greenhouse control system achieves monitoring and control of a greenhouse environment by
using sensors and actuators which are under the control of a microcontroller running a computer program.
The system is composed of two stations: Remote monitoring station and the Actuators/Sensors Station.
The controller used in the actuators/ sensors station which ensures that the microclimatic parameters stay
within pre-defined values as determined and set by the user is the Arduino prototyping platform. The
climatic conditions of the greenhouse and state of actuators are transmitted to the remote monitoring
station via a pair of low power XBee Modulator-Demodulator (MODEM). The codes for the controller
were written in the Arduino programming language, debugged, compiled, and burnt into the
microcontroller using the Arduino integrated development environment (IDE). A scaled-down prototype
of the system was built and tested. Automation of a greenhouse brings about efficient data acquisition
and control of the microclimatic parameters. It also significantly reduces the labour involved in its
maintenance thus making the system useful for rural farmers, small scale agriculturists, gardeners, and
agricultural researchers.

Keywords: Greenhouse, Automated Agriculture, Embedded System, Arduino

1. Introduction

Food shortage is one of the greatest problems confronting mankind in the 21st century. Global warming
and other weather elements have claimed substantial land mass that was available for crops cultivation.
In order to address the problem, greenhouse practice which has been in existence for a very long time
(Wikipedia, 2014) is now modernized and deployed in many parts of the world. This technology is yet
to be embraced by many developing countries (Okunola, 2013).

Modern greenhouse technology deploys automation in agriculture which is now common place due to
the low costs of electronic components required for its implementation. A lot of efforts have been made
by many researchers to automate the traditional greenhouse system. In the work by Sumit et al (2012) an
embedded system closely monitors the microclimatic parameters of a greenhouse round the clock and
activates actuators when safe thresholds are exceeded in order to restore optimum conditions. Their
design employs a Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) which is directly interfaced to a microcontroller that
ensures that the user is continuously alerted about the conditions inside the greenhouse. Clearly, a system
of this type can provide information to the user about the conditions inside the greenhouse only when the
user is at the physical location. A Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) with smart irrigation capability is
discussed by Mahmoud and Alaa (2013). This system monitors the microclimatic parameters around
each row of crops and activates appropriate pumps for irrigation when the moisture level drops below a

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ISSN: 2203-9465 (Print) ISSN: 2203-9473 (Online)

safe threshold. The drawback of this system lies in its inability to control the other microclimatic
parameters such as temperature and humidity which play a major role in the development and yield of
crops. Also, the user can only view the conditions of the greenhouse at the physical location since it
employs LCD. Rahali et al (2011) developed a system that is based on the Global System for Mobile
Communication (GSM) that allows a greenhouse user to monitor and control the microclimatic
parameters via Short Message Service (SMS). The main pitfall of the system is that the control action is
not automatic; it is initiated by the user who may not always be attentive and this could have adverse
effects on the crops. Two separate web-based WSN applications were respectively developed and
discussed by Qiang and Ming (2008) and Mancuso and Bustaffa (2006). These systems allow a
greenhouse user to monitor the conditions over the internet. Although the internet communication
platform is almost always available, it requires that the accessing device such as a Universal Serial Bus
(USB) MODEM should have enough download data capability which may not always be the case in
developing countries.

The system that has been designed in this work consists of two stations: Sensors/Actuators station and
Remote Monitoring station. The sensors/actuators station is the heart of the system and uses a
microcontroller, Arduino Uno board (Banzi, 2009, and Melgar and Diez, 2012), XBee MODEMs, and a
number of sensors and actuators as major components. The Arduino board is programmed with a
sequence of codes called a sketch that enables it to read data from sensors that are representative of the
greenhouse climatic conditions. The controller processes these data and issues commands to the actuators
to restore desired optimum conditions required by the plants. The controller also reads the conditions of
the actuators and transmits same along with the calculated controlled variables via the XBee MODEM.
Another XBee MODEM receives this information over a defined and secure channel and sends it to the
serial port. The information is then displayed on the terminal with the aid of XCTU software installed in
a PC. Some advantages of the system include:
(i) The Graphical User Interface (GUI) of the system is simple and easy to implement since it does
not require additional coding by the user to display remote greenhouse information. The system also
displays a history of five (5) records of greenhouse conditions received at intervals of 5 seconds.
(ii) The wireless link between the two stations is not provided by the internet that requires data that
must be purchased from providers, neither is it designed around the GSM that requires cost of air-time.
Once the system is set up, information about the greenhouse condition will always be available at the
desired remote location.
(iii) The system monitors and controls all the microclimatic parameters of interest and can even be
upgraded to control additional parameters should the need arise. The system is fully automated: once it
is set up it drives itself automatically without any form of assistance from the user.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1 System Architecture

The automated greenhouse control system, whose block diagram is depicted in figure 1, is made up of
two principal units: Sensors/Actuators station and Remote Monitoring station. These two units consist
of sensors for light (Light dependent resistor), temperature (LM35), humidity (HIH4030) (Hobby
Electronics, 2014) and moisture (VH400) (Vegetronix, 2014); fan, fogger, drippers and artificial light;
Arduino microcontroller board; XBee MODEMs; XBee adapter board; and a personal computer (PC).
The sensors/actuators station is the heart of the system that is responsible for regulating the greenhouse
environment. The sensors acquire the environmental data. After the data have been filtered to remove
noise they are made available to the Arduino board which then computes the current values of the
controlled variables and compares them with the set thresholds. If any of the controlled variables is
outside a safe limit the corresponding actuator is activated to restore the optimum condition. The Arduino
board also reads the states of the actuators and transmits the information along with the current values of
the controlled variables to the remote monitoring station via XBee radio frequency (RF) MODEM pair
that operate at a frequency of 2.4 GHz. A large number of wireless linking devices exist (Javvin, 2007),
however XBee has been used for this work primarily because of its suitability for low power data
transmission (Gianfranco, 2009).

2.2 Hardware Design

2.2.1The Sensors/Actuators Station

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ISSN: 2203-9465 (Print) ISSN: 2203-9473 (Online)

The schematic diagram of the sensors/actuators station is shown in figure 2. This has an XBee MODEM
mounted on a breakout board which is in turn interfaced to Arduino uno Rev 3 (The actual
implementation employs an XBee shield for convenience). The signals from the sensors are filtered using
R-C low pass filters (LPF) that have been built with LM324 operational amplifiers (Op-amp). The
actuators are activated by signals provided by appropriate digital pins of the Arduino board according to
the thresholds set by the user. Finally, the current values of the controlled variables and states of actuators
are transmitted to the remote monitoring station via RF XBee MODEM by the serialprint commands in
the Arduino sketch.

2.3 The Remote Monitoring Station

The signal transmitted by the XBee at the sensors/actuators station is received and demodulated by the
XBee in the remote monitoring station which then passes the information to the serial port and displays
it in the terminal environment of XCTU software installed in a PC. This approach of creating a GUI
requires no coding by the user and the information is still presented in a visually appealing format.

Temperature Light Humidity Moisture

Sensor Sensor Sensor Sensor

Signal Filter
Antenna

ARDUINO BOARD XBEE

RADIO
MODEM

Relay Control Module

Cooling Artificial Fogger Drippers

Fans Light

(Sensors/Actuators Station)

PERSONAL
XBEE USB XBEE
COMPUTER
ADAPTER RADIO
MODEM

Figure 1. Block Diagram of Automated Greenhouse Control System

(Remote Monitoring Station)
2.4 Software Design

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ISSN: 2203-9465 (Print) ISSN: 2203-9473 (Online)

The control strategy for the system in this work is developed for the individual parameters to be
controlled as follows:
(1) The temperature control requires the definition of two threshold limits: upper limit and lower limit.
When the upper limit is exceeded a fan is activated to cool the greenhouse environment and when the
temperature drops below the lower limit, the fan is deactivated while a heater is activated and vice-versa.
(2) Humidity control is defined by a threshold set by the user. When the humidity of the greenhouse
enclosure falls below this threshold, a fogging system is activated and then deactivated when optimum
condition is restored.
(3) The moisture control is defined by a threshold which ensures that if the soil moisture content falls
below the set value drippers are activated, and then deactivated when optimum condition is restored.
(4) The lighting condition is controlled by two set points: upper limit and lower limit. The upper limit
determines when the light is activated while the lower limit determines when it is deactivated. This
strategy is primarily used to extend day light or compensate for inadequate natural lighting according to
the desire of the user.

2.5 Program Flowcharts

The main flowchart for the program of the automated greenhouse control system is shown in figure 3.
The flowcharts for the various subroutines are shown in figures 4, 5, 6, and 7. The program for the system
was written in Arduino language which is actually a subset of the C/C++ programming language (Purdum,
2012). The program was written, debugged, compiled and burnt into the flash memory of the
microcontroller on the board using Arduino IDE.

Figure 2a. Schematic of Actuators Station of the Automated Greenhouse Control System

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R13 R16

+5V

_
1 20
Vcc AD0/ DIO0
_

R10
DIN AD1/ DIO1

+ R17 DOUT AD2/ DIO2

LM35
+

1/4 LM324
C9 DIO 12
XBEE AD3/ DIO3
1/4 LM324 R24 RESET RST/ DIO6 R25
R12 R15 RSSI/ DIO 10 ASSOC/ DIO5
D10
DIO 11 VREF
NC 0N/ SLEEP
+5V ARef R23
DTR/ DI0 8 CTS/ DIO 7
D13
_

Gnd DIO 4
Reset D12 10 11
_

R9
3.3V D11
R22
+

5V D10 A
+

HIH-4030
1/4 LM324 Gnd D9
C8
1/4 LM324 Gnd D8 B
R11 R14 +9V Vin ARDUINO D7
R21

D6 C
A0 D5 R20
+5V
A1 D4 D
_

A2 D3
R19
_

R8 A3 D2 E
+

A4 (Tx) D1
VH400
+

A5 (Rx) D0
SENSOR
1/4 LM324
1/4 LM324 R18
C7

+5V
_
_

R6 R7
+
+

1/4 LM324
LDR ( NORP 12 ) C6
1/4 LM324

Figure 2b. Schematic of Sensors Station of the Automated Greenhouse Control System

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ISSN: 2203-9465 (Print) ISSN: 2203-9473 (Online)

Start

Initialization

No Instruction
received?

Yes
Read sensors data

Compute current values of controlled variables

from sensor data and store them

Retrieve Temperature Value

Perform Temperature Operations

Retrieve Light Intensity Value

Perform Light Intensity Operation

Retrieve Relative Humidity Value

Perform Relative Humidity Operation

Retrieve Soil Moisture Content Value

Perform Soil Moisture Content Operation

Transmit Current Values of Controlled

Variables and State of Actuators to XBee
MODEM

Halt Program for 5 Seconds

Figure 3. Main program flowchart for the Automated Greenhouse Control System

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Temperature T = Current Value of Temperature

Operation
TL = Lower Limit of Temperature
TU = Upper Limit of Temperature
T < TL?

Yes
No

Turn Heater Turn Heater

OFF ON

T > TU?
Yes
No

Turn Fan OFF Turn Fan ON

Read State of Heater and Fan

End
Temperature
Operation

Figure 4. Flow Chart for Temperature Subroutine

Light LI = Current Value of Light Intensity

Intensity
Operation Li(L) = Lower Threshold for Light Intensity
Li(U) = Upper Threshold for Light Intensity
LI < Li(L)?

No

LI > Li(U)?
Yes
No

Turn ON Turn OFF

Light Light

Read State of Light Hardware

End Light Intensity

Operation

Figure 5. Flow Chart for Light Intensity Sub-routine

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Relative RH = Current Value of Relative Humidity

Humidity
Operation Rh(T) = Threshold Value for Relative Humidity

RH < Rh(T)?

Yes
No

Deactivate Activate
Fogger Fogger

Read State of Fogger

End Relative
Humidity
Operation

Figure 6. Flow Chart for Relative Humidity Subroutine

Soil SM = Current Value of Soil Moisture Content

Moisture
Operation Sm(T) = Threshold Value for Soil Moisture Content

SM < Sm(T)?
Yes
No

Deactive Activate
Drippers Drippers

Read State of Drippers Hardware

End Soil
Moisture Operation

Figure 7. Flow Chart for Soil Moisture Content Subroutine

3. Results

A typical screenshot taken during program development and debugging is shown in figure 8. The top and
bottom views of the system built on vero boards are shown in figures 9 and 10 respectively. The
assembled system is shown in figure 11, while figure 12 shows the system mounted on a prototype
greenhouse. The sensors/actuators station was set up on a bright sunny day and powered; a few seconds
later the remote monitoring station started receiving and displaying information about the greenhouse
conditions as shown in figure 13. The range of reliable transmission was around 40 m line-of-sight and
15 m with very thick and solid concrete walls posing as obstructions.

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Figure 8. Typical Screenshot during Program Development

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Figure 9. Top View of the Systems Circuit Board

Figure 10. Bottom View of the Systems Circuit Board

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Figure 11. Assembled System with Sensors Connected

Figure 12. Prototype of Greenhouse with Automated System Mounted

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Figure 13. GUI Displaying Greenhouse Conditions

4. Discussion

When the system was set up and tested, it was observed that the sensors/actuators station reacted well to
restore optimum conditions each time any of the microclimatic parameters varied from the set thresholds.
It was also observed that the communication between the two stations was reliable up to a line-of-sight
distance of 40 m. This range can be improved by using XBee-Pro MODEMs or altering the network
architecture. The system described in this work was constructed and mounted on a prototype greenhouse
to demonstrate its workability. The control system described will be able to operate a practical greenhouse
but the driver circuit may need relays that can handle the power required to drive the actuators in question.

5. Conclusion

The automated greenhouse control system that has been successfully designed and built is this work is
meant to protect seedlings in nurseries from intruders, and also grow them to maturity should the need
arise using a very small area of land as opposed to open field cultivation which may require more square
meters of land to produce the same amount of crops. This system produces healthier crops since pests

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are usually kept away from the greenhouse enclosure. The systems reaction time to restoration of
variations of microclimatic parameters suffers from a few seconds delay because of the program scan
cycle and the electro-mechanical relays used. The system is fully automated as it does not require any
form of adjustment from the user. The microclimatic parameters are also available at a remote terminal
for the user to read and to monitor the performance of the greenhouse.

References

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Mahmoud, S. and Alaa, I. 2013. Greenhouse Micro-climate Monitoring System based on Wireless sensor
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Hobby Electronics. 2014. Humidity Sensor HIH4030 Breakout. Accessed from:

http://www.hobbytronics.co.uk/humidity-sensor-hih4030

Vegetronix. 2014. VH400 Soil Moisture Sensor Probe. Accessed from:

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