The GNSS-R soil moisture mapping drone: Helping farmers to make better decisions on irrigation water management. Presentation delivered by Tamme van der Wal at the GeoSpatial World Forum in Lisbon 26-MAY-2015. Mistrale develops a soil-moisture mapping drone. It is using the reflective GNSS technology to measure soil moisture. Presentation is about the business case of users.

1. This project has received funding from the European GNSS Agency under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme
under grant agreement no. 641606.
MISTRALE:
Soil moisture measurements using GNSS-R

2. MISTRALE:
Soil moisture measurements using GNSS-R
Helping farmers to make better decisions on
irrigation water management
Tamme van der Wal – AeroVision BV

3. Stakeholder Platform
• Group of invited experts;
• Workshops connected to other (related) events;
• Feedback to the project on usability and business;
• You’ll be the first to be informed.
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4. Agricultural water needs
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65%
35%
After:
M. Falkemark

5. Irrigable Area
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Source: UNESCO / FAO

6. Share of irrigated land in UAA
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Top20 EU regions, irrigable area
by NUTS 2 regions, 2007 and 2010
(% of utilised agricultural area)
Source: EUROSTAT

8. Irrigated land and restriction
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Irrigated area
(% of agricultural land)
Source: Alterra, Wageningen UR
Irrigation from surface water
on potatoes prohibited

9. Farmers worried about water
Recent survey:
• 65% of Dutch farmers are worried about excess and
shortage of water;
• 60% state that they don’t have the right instruments
to deal with water problems ….
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15. Spatial variation
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17. Simplify
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20. 1
GPS Satellites
Broadcast radio
Signals
2
Antenna on UAV receives simultaneously
DIRECT and REFLECTED signals
3
Retrieve
Soil Moisture
GNSS-R:
Land Monitoring Concept
GPS, GALILEO
High interaction of L-band with the soil water content

21. GNSS like radar signals
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23. 20 min. to take off
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24. Features
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Wingspan 4,2 m Length 1,5m
90x21x23cm3
Payload bay
volume
5 Kg
Payload Mass
4 500 m
Maximum
Altitude
1 000 Km
Range
10 h
Endurance
180 Km/h
Maximum
speed
26-MAY-2015

25. Benefitting from Galileo
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26. Advantages of GNSS-R
• Measuring spatial variability of soil moisture
• Takes advantage of GNSS as a omni present source
– Multipurpose; precise; all-weather; long-time available etc.
• We can measure both low (drought) and high
(flooding) water content;
• Galileo will be the 3rd
constellation  improve
accuracy and reliability;
• GNSS = Open Data !!
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27. RPAS with GNSS-R
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29. For more information please check www.Mistrale.eu
This project has received funding from the European GNSS Agency
under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation
programme under grant agreement no. 641606.
Thank you for your attention.