Environmental Monitoring System by Using Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

Abstract

This paper presents a reliable and low cost environmental monitoring system. The system uses an Unmanned Ariel Vehicle (UAV) equipped with a set of sensors, microcontroller, wireless system, and other accessories. The system consists of two systems namely air quality monitoring system and water quality monitoring system. The air quality monitoring system consists of a set of gas sensors and microcontroller. This system measures the concentration of greenhouse gases at different altitudes under different environmental conditions. On the other hand, the water quality monitoring system consists of a set of water quality sensors, microcontroller, and water sampling unit. This system collects water samples from off-shore and on-shore water sources and measures water quality parameters. The present system is capable of recording the measured data in an onboard SD card. It is also able to send data to a ground monitoring unit through a wireless system. To ensure reliability in measurement the sensors are calibrated before deployment. Finally, the system is upgradable and reconfigurable. The system has been tested to measure air and water quality at different local areas. Some these measured data are also presented in this paper.