Abstract
The main aim of smart cities is to achieve the sustainable use of resources. In order to make the correct use of resources, an accurate monitoring and management is needed. In some places, like underground aquifers, access for monitoring can be difficult, therefore the use of sensors can be a good solution. Groundwater is very important as a water resource. Just in the USA, aquifers represent the water source for 50% of the population. However, aquifers are endangered due to the contamination. One of the most important parameters to monitor in groundwater is the salinity, as high salinity levels indicate groundwater salinization. In this paper, we present a specific sensor for monitoring groundwater salinization. The sensor is able to measure the electric conductivity of water, which is directly related to the water salinization. The sensor, which is composed of two copper coils, measures the magnetic field alterations due to the presence of electric charges in the water. Different salinities of the water generate different alterations. Our sensor has undergone several tests in order to obtain a conductivity sensor with enough accuracy. First, several prototypes are tested and are compared with the purpose of choosing the best combination of coils. After the best prototype was selected, it was calibrated using up to 30 different samples. Our conductivity sensor presents an operational range from 0.585 mS/cm to 73.8 mS/cm, which is wide enough to cover the typical range of water salinities. With this work, we have demonstrated that it is feasible to measure water conductivity using solenoid coils and that this is a low cost application for groundwater monitoring.
Highlights
The Smart City concept covers several aspects. It is based on the integration of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) systems in urban environments to improve the use of resources and reduce the emissions of harmful gases in order to achieve the sustainability of cities [1,2]
We present a specific conductivity sensor designed for monitoring groundwater
The difficulty of continuous monitoring can be solved using an appropriate wireless sensor network in order to gather the measurements on site when required, but many difficulties arise, so it is necessary to design suitable, simple and inexpensive sensors
Summary
The Smart City concept covers several aspects. It is based on the integration of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) systems in urban environments to improve the use of resources and reduce the emissions of harmful gases in order to achieve the sustainability of cities [1,2]. It is possible to find some papers where authors work on the concept of sustainability for smart cities. Some examples such as [3,4] are focused on saving energy and public transport for improving the heat and energy management. There are even some works where the authors present a smart grid for water distribution in a smart city [5]. To simplify the equations system, let us assume that all lines of the magnetic field created by the coil 1 flow through the coil 2
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