Overview

This report aims to decrease some of the difficulties associated with the practice of vertical farming in addition to providing a uniquely integrated design process. The collaboration of several systems including, an agriculturally inspired farm automation tool, intelligent precision farming practices, a purification and highly developed reverse osmosis process for water purification, and a self-healing concrete solution that will provide seismic resistant structure. Our mechanized farming tool operates on a railing system allowing it to reach all area on a floor to sow seeds, spray pesticides, pull out weeds, and harvest strawberries hands-free. Precision farming is the practice of adjusting crop treatments in order to increase production efficiency. This system stores all factors which significantly affect crop yields and develop an approximation tool to gain a better understanding of these critical factors and crop response. To purify the water that is responsible for the irrigation on all floors a filtration system that uses a Thin Film Composite (TFC) membrane to do reverse osmosis filtration. The building’s design utilizes recycled materials and structured to handle static and dynamic loads on each floor.

Goal

To design a system that purifies water and uses eco-friendly fertilizer to support user-controlled mechanized farming practices within a structure that meets the strength and serviceability requirements of an 18 story building.

Objectives

Design an autonomous agricultural robotic system that is capable of planting strawberry seeds, weed control, spraying pesticide, and harvesting. Create a sustainable, low-cost precision agriculture technique that enables users to interact remotely and make decisions for the vertical farm based on the suggestions created from data collected from low energy sensors. Design a water purification system that is capable of providing enough clean water for irrigation use while keeping the pH level in check and providing liquid fertilizer for the crops to grow. Design a multi-story building that meets both strength and serviceability requirements when subjected to lateral loads and gravity loads.

Design Prompt

In order to produce high-quality food and feed a growing world population, new methods of sustainable farming must be developed that are designed to increase yields and reduce ecological impact. Unlike traditional cultivation, vertical farming has the potential to reduce the need to create additional farmland and increase the productivity of a farm by a factor of 4 to 6 depending on the crop due to year-round productivity. Our goal will be to establish a robotic-centric approach to agriculture that takes advantage of modern

engineering simulations, mathematics, the revolution in sensor technology, controlled environment agriculture, fertigation, and indoor farming techniques to transform modern food production. The spire will have an 18-floor, 256.5 x 114 ft farm located around the UC Irvine campus, and our goal is optimizing it to produce 15,000 tons of food annually. This paper has been peer reviewed by: Mazen Nader Alkhatib, Abdullah Jawhar, Myriam Khalil, Daniela Uriostegui, and Jesus Reyes.

Presented at the UCI Engineering Conference, February 16-18, 2019 at University of California Irvine.

Peer Reviewers:   Mazen Nader Alkhatib, Abdullah Jawhar, Myriam Khalil, Daniela Uriostegui, Jesus Reyes

Overview

Located in the UC Irvine Campus next to the prestigious Engineering department  the design of the wood-frame autonomous administration building is a quality representation of innovation  design integration and environmental sustainability. The building is composed of a concrete first floor lobby that is 14 feet with high ceilings for aesthetics and room for harnessing any design systems. The other floors are composed of a glue laminated wood-frame structure  raising 12 feet each story. Each floor will contain a total area of 2880 square feet  providing administrative utility parcels  such as office spaces and conference rooms. The important features of the new autonomous building is its self-healing concrete  fire resistivity  and a passive heating/ cooling system. The self-healing concrete minimizes the formation of cracks  preventing the need for maintenance in the future. Glue-laminated recycled wood is used for fire resistivity and its stronger nominal capacity. The passive cooling/ heating system will be using 28 solar power integrated windows called SolarWindows™ for better energy storage and leverage natural elements. The cost and budgeting was also calculated to be less costly and more environmental friendly to construct than a steel frame structure. Indeed  there is a urgent need for new clean  renewable energy sources.

Current energy sources are outdated while many have negative impacts on the

environment. The goal of this project is to implement a molten salt tower to provide eco-friendly power. Molten salt towers have already been successfully implemented in several locations including Nevada  China  Spain  and Germany. This system uses the sun’s energy  molten salt technology  and thermal storage to generate clean renewable energy. In addition to building the molten salt tower  passive stack ventilation will be used to ventilate the building using little power. Evaporative coolers will be used in conjunction with the passive stack ventilation in order to cool the building when outside air is not enough to cool the building. The main challenge of this project is finding land large enough to build the tower on. To overcome this challenge  the tower will be scaled down to fit in the lot behind Vista Del Campo  while maintaining maximum efficiency and the ability to produce >4000W. At the same time  incorporating the different

electrical systems requires a highly sophisticated device control.

The device control system incorporates Fault Detection and Diagnostic (FDD) systems  with an array of sensors that are connected to a Programmable Logic Computer (PLC). This will autonomously collect measurements and follow smart pathways to respond to certain situations. The computer considers the location of the sensors  severity of the situation  and follows smart pathways to ensure the most effective solution to the situation. A server connected to the PLC communicates with employees through an app. By incorporating location in the output of the sensors  the building will run more sustainably and efficiently. The use of an app will streamline every day office tasks and communicate with employees in case of an emergency. Also  delivering day-to-day mail can be incorporated by the smart autonomous Destixign interior delivery system. Destixign has a system that will not only save a client’s time and money in the

long-run  but will provide safe  efficient  and reliable delivery within the building. In this design report the team introduces the mechanical innovative and economic advantages with their system. Destixign still engineered their project in a way that meets all the requirements and has a low budget which will attract more customers. As delineated before the team’s design uses the universal law of magnetism to transport a package. This allows for a system which will be economic durable and best innovative.

Presented at the UCI Engineering Conference, May 26-28, 2018 at University of California Irvine.