Next level:

Unlocking Potential in
Aquaponic Data

Jonathan Reyes
CEO & Co-founder of Aquaponics AI
About Me
Aquaponics AI
aquaponics.ai

Tulua for Sustainable Agriculture

tulua.io

The Aquaponics Association

aquaponicsassociation.org

European Aquaponics Association

europeanaquaponicsassociation.org
The Misconceptions The Deep Dive.
The Value
Beginners
1. Misconceptions about Data
2. Value of Recording
Intermediate
3. Beginners Kit
4. The Intermediate Hacker
Advanced
5. Commercial IoT Solution

…
What to take away
from this talk

“I can do this”
See a next step.
1. Misconceptions
Tracking my data is…

HARD
“Not good with tech.”
“I don’t know where to start”
“I don’t know how to get insights”
Tracking my data is…

EXPENSIVE
“I can’t afford to get high end sensors”
“Where do I put all of my data”
“I can’t afford a developer”
I don’t have enough

TIME
“Too busy running the farm.”
“Too busy to analyze the data.”
 I can’t find the

PERFECT SOLUTION

“I need the all-in-one solution”

My plants tell me

EVERYTHING

I need to know
I don’t need to track my data...

Ryan Lefers
Research Scientist
PhD, Professional Engineer
Water Desalination and
Reuse Center (WDRC)
King Abdullah University
of Science and Technology (KAUST)
Without data, it is impossible to
make informed decisions or to
make an evaluation of what went
wrong. In addition, tracking data
allows an individual grower to
procure the services of an outside
expert, someone who can look at the
historical trends and make
recommendations for improving...
 Operating an aquaponics system
without real-time data is like driving
a car without a speedometer. You
might get by for a while, but you are
never at the optimum point where
Ryan Lefers you are just under the speed limit
Research Scientist (maximum productivity for your
PhD, Professional Engineer
zone) but without risk of being fined
Water Desalination and
Reuse Center (WDRC) (crop failure).
King Abdullah University
of Science and Technology (KAUST)
2. The Value of Data
 Example

Cycling a System
without Fish
Ammonia + Nitrite + Nitrate
This is what it looks like when you don’t have data. You
get the chart and look at where you are at.

Can I add fish now?

When can I add fish?
 Example

Cycling a System
without Fish
Ammonia + Nitrite + Nitrate

A basic chart showing the common patterns of

fishless cycling using an Ammonia source. When
looking at how these lines are recorded, what can you
determine?
 Example

Asking for Help

When doing aquaponics in community and
asking for help you will need to most likely share
your water quality metrics.

These are actual posts of people asking for help.

Basics
pH
Ammonia
Nitrite
Nitrate
 We find tracking data an essential
part of our daily farm operations. By
recording water quality parameters,
crop rotations, nutrients, pest
regiments and so many other things
Tawnya Sawyer that go into our work, we can
Owner of Colorado Aquaponics maintain food safety compliance.
Founder of the Aquaponics Association

offers early warnings so that things can
Tawnya Sawyer
Owner of Colorado Aquaponics
Founder of the Aquaponics Association
Recording this data helps us with
forecasting, it helps measure
production levels and trends, and
be addressed before they become
problems. We also use this data for
financial analysis and cost controls,
informed decision making, and to
better understand the positive impact
that aquaponic farming has on the
environment, our customers and the
overall sustainability of our business.
The Potential.
● Efficient use of feed ● Pest management
● Efficient use of nutrients ● Better business decisions
● Clear crop scheduling and successful businesses
● Investment takes us ● Government legislation
seriously ● Home growers insight
● Urban policy ● Prevent pump failure
● Food security ● Preventative care on
● Automated food safety greenhouse appliances (AC
compliance units, etc)
Starting where you’re at.
Scaling with your goals.
@AMSAW FARM @HYDRO.BOT @IRON OX

Beginners Kit Intermediate Hacker Commercial IoT Sensors

Risk: Low Risk: Low Risk: High

Cost: Low Cost: Medium Cost: High
Time Commitment: Low Time Commitment: Medium Time Commitment: High
Complexity: Low Complexity: Low Complexity: High
Data Volume: Low Data Volume: Medium Data Volume: Ungodly
 Beginner Setup

Manual testing using Recording in a Creating charts that

chemical solutions and software like Google use the data and point
tracking temperature Sheets to ensure data to danger areas,
highs and lows. is centralized and in trends and insights.
the cloud.
 Intermediate Hacker Setup

Manual testing of
certain expensive
sensors like DO,
Ammonia, etc.

A data store keeps the

data and gives access
Creating charts that
to the records.
use the data and point
Programmed sensors to danger areas,
sending data at fast trends and insights.
intervals (~10 seconds)
to a data processing
service or local device.
 Commercial IoT/Automated Setup
Webhooks and
Manual testing of things callbacks to 3rd party
like BRIX and other less services like slack,
frequent tests as well as Pagerduty, etc.
pest management
Creating charts that
records
use the data and point
to danger areas,
trends and insights.

Storing in a big data

Many sensors Local device gateway solution using massive
monitoring DO, pH, that will route traffic, Providing real-time
ingestion rates and
Ammonia, Nitrogen, summarize data, alerts for actionable
real-time calculations
EC, Temperature, package and send items in your data
on data and alerts
Humidity, Light, etc. data to the cloud and
provide immediate
offline alerts.
Image from @postscapes
Thank You.
Jonathan Reyes
CEO & Co-founder at Aquaponics AI

Contact Information
jon@aquaponics.ai
aquaponics.ai

IoT Sensor List

http://bit.ly/aquaponictech