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Precision irrigation provides a means for evaluating a crop’s water requirements and a means for applying the right amount at the right time. Applying precision irrigation practices offers significant potential for saving water, energy, and money. Further, it has the potential to increases crop yield. There is an additional positive environmental impact from precision irrigation in that farm runoff, a major source of water pollution, can be reduced. This paper focuses on the irrigation of California agriculture, which uses nearly 80% of the state’s water and more than ten billion Kilowatt hours of electricity annually. That is enough electricity to power one million typical American households each year. The approximate power plant capacity required to power California irrigation through the months of May through October is 2500 MW, which is equivalent to 250 Min-Nuke power plants running at an average of 10MW each. The carbon footprint associated with the power is approximately six million metric tons of CO2 per year.
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