Design of a Solar Powered IoT (Internet of Things) Remote Water Quality Management System for a Biofloc Aquaculture Technology

Abstract

The Philippines is considered as one of the world's top producing countries of aquaculture species. Unfortunately, this status was greatly affected due to the influence of climate change and the deteriorating water quality and declining fishing stocks. Thus, fish farmers and aquaculture researchers have been searching for new and innovative technologies that could be used to address climate change issues. One of these technologies is the use of Biofloc systems. This technology uses a zero-water-exchange, and it also accumulates microorganisms that serve as a food source for the species. In view of the complexity of the process, the use of water quality management is highly recommended. In this purview, this study aimed to design and develop a solar powered automated water management system for a biofloc production. Hence, the iterative and incremental models were used for the software development process. The prototype was fabricated using the Internet of things framework composed of a mobile app which has the following features: account management, fish/shrimp profile, water quality management, auto feeding and manual controls. Based on the results of the study, the mobile app successfully sends alert values to the Arduino controller, serving as a reference in activating the corresponding relays for managing the dissolved oxygen (DO), pH, and temp level. Thus, maintaining the water quality parameters are vital for the biofloc process.