The start of the project with the cow water in Veberöd was an event on a midsummer evening a few years ago. Late at night, the cows' owners got a call that the cows had escaped through the fence, and all they had to do was interrupt the midsummer party and head out into the field and hunt cows. The reason turned out to be that the pump for the water cow had broken and the thirsty cows had run away in search of water.

The following year, Smarta Villages made the cow's water shelter an IoT project, and in the tub there were sensors at different levels to sense whether there was water or not. And oddly enough, it was precisely on Midsummer's Eve a year after the first escape that the alarm went off again. It turned out that the pump's battery had run out. An hour later, the pump was running again and the fault had time to be fixed before the cows became too thirsty. The project showed what incredible benefits modern technology can bring. Without level sensors, it could have taken a long time before the fault had been detected and repaired, which would have caused suffering to the cows.

The measurements continued and also provided new knowledge that the project participants did not expect from the beginning. Smart villages had two levels on the sensors, one located 5 cm below the surface of the water cone and one located 10 cm from the bottom. It turned out that it is easy to run a few hundred liters at once when the cows come to drink - and the green graph in diagram 1 how the water level drops and is usually quickly automatically replenished with the water pump. In the diagram you can also see a real alarm — this is when the light blue line goes up to 200 kPa.

This means that the tub is emptied below the level of the lower sensor and that it has not refilled with any water. Then alarms were sent via notification in an app and the farmer received a message via text message. Graph 2 shows how many alarms came in a week — in this case, two. A learning and thirst-quenching statistic!

What was the result?

The project clearly showed that it is not just a city that benefits from its sensors. In rural areas, of course, there are some needs that are similar to those in the city, but there are also many needs and challenges that are completely different from those in a city and that can be solved with the help of appropriate actors.

Fact: Korna's watercress is getting smart

The project is a sub-project of the SOM project is part of the Strategic Innovation Programme for the Internet of Things, IoT Sweden, which is funded by Vinnova. Anders Trana at Future by Lund was the project manager for the entire project. The project started on 1 September 2017 and ran until December 2020.

Project Time: 2018-04-01 - 2018-08-31

Project Manager: Jan Malmgren, Village Development

Project partners: Village development, Sensefarm, Sensative

‍

‍