Overview

Greenmetrics provides customized solutions to turn real-world data into real-time decisions to optimize resource usage and mitigate climate change risks. Founded in 2022, Greenmetrics was accepted into Startup Lisboa, a reputable startup incubator in Portugal and soon after began deploying solutions entirely focused on impact initiatives to contribute to the UN's Sustainable Development Goals.

In Portugal, Spain, and the South of France, golf courses use around 3 million liters of water per year. Increasingly unpredictable weather conditions, extreme drought, and high water costs motivate business owners to reduce excess consumption. Utilizing essential data, greenkeepers can irrigate strictly according to soil needs.

In May 2023, Greenmetrics began deploying irrigation optimization systems using soil moisture sensors in three of the Top 10 national ranking golf courses in Cascais, Comporta and Lagos.

Results Snapshot

• 14-28% Reduction in Irrigation Costs: Pilots over the past six months have indicated an average of 1-2 cancellable irrigation events per week that result in an estimated 14-28% savings rate.

• 5-10x Hardware Cost Savings when Compared to Alternatives: Greenmetrics solutions are 5-10x more economic than most existing options.

• ~1.5 year ROI: Taking into account the full implementation and a full one year subscription, ROI is estimated at only 1.5 years, based on the average water and energy cost baseline.

Challenge

Water usage at golf courses in Portugal and Spain is a problem due to water scarcity, environmental impact, regulatory frameworks, and economic considerations. The climate in Portugal, Spain, and France contributes to the limited water resources, necessitating efficient water management. Some common challenges include:

• Government imposed reduction in water usage: As droughts increase and water resources become more scarce, businesses are subject to government imposed restrictions. In Algarve, Portugal, the government imposed a 20% reduction in water use in golf courses.

• High water and energy costs in turf management: Due to large surface area, constant irrigation, variable weather conditions, and a need for consistent quality, the resources used for turf management are very high.

Solution

Greenmetrics irrigation optimization solution helps balance the water needs of golf courses with environmental sustainability, regulation compliance, and cost reduction. Soil temperature, humidity and conductivity sensors and analytics tools were deployed at 5 of the Top 10 golf courses in Portugal that allow users to define specific intervals of soil humidity and monitor water content at root level.

This data is then used to adjust irrigation schedules and only irrigate when necessary. The solution can reduce irrigation costs by 20-30%, equivalent to 60-90 million liters per course per year. These solutions also significantly reduce labor intensive tasks like manual soil moisture measurements and optimize turf health by avoiding excess humidity conditions that are prone to the development of fungi and diseases.

Pilot projects include 5-10 sensors deployed per golf course, with full-scale implementation including about four sensors per hole and 72 total sensors on a typical 18-hole typical golf course. Longer term, Greenmetrics data collection and visualization tools also allow users to generate insights to help them better characterize specific soil types, water holding capacity, soil salinity, and more, enabling a data-sharing community of turf experts to help accelerate the transition to more sustainable practices.

“Using Helium, we are gaining traction in a market that is only possible because there is easy access to a decentralized infrastructure that doesn’t require large investment in private infrastructure by the client.”

—Tiago, Greenmetrics

Results

After the sensors were deployed, Greenmetrics immediately began identifying unnecessary irrigation events and providing insight on soil water dynamics. As displayed in the image of the dashboard below, optimal humidity for the greens was determined to be 8-12% humidity. Based on conditions after precipitation, unnecessary irrigation events are quickly identified.

For example, when it rained on June 9th, the following scheduled irrigation was canceled and as natural moisture was able to irrigate. Watering could then resume precisely when the lower threshold is met.

As real-time data is collected and acted upon day-to-day, the greenkeeper was able to begin fine-tuning irrigation schedules and predicting needs based on precipitation, temperature, and humidity levels. In the long run, this optimization process leads to standardized playing conditions, improves sustainability and minimizes operational costs.

In a typical golf course in the South of Portugal , 50% of irrigation spending happens in June, July, and August, and 80% is between May and September. When golf courses can act on this data once per week, they save about 15% in irrigation consumption. If twice per week, they can save up to 30%. Pilots over the past six months have indicated an average of 1-2 cancellable irrigation events per week that result in an estimated 14-28% savings rate.

Greenmetrics solutions are 5-10x more economic than most existing alternatives taking into account gateways, other agro-tech sensors, and network service costs from competing public networks and IoT products.

Typical spending in water and energy costs in the South of Portugal is about EUR 150k/year. With target savings per year of 20%, this would amount to EUR 30k per year in potential savings. The cost of the full implementation plus a 1-year subscription is about EUR 45k, estimating an ROI of around 1.5 years. With this ROI, in addition to significant positive environmental impact, the Greenmetrics solution delivers very favorable results to businesses seeking to save water and related costs.

What's next?

Greenmetrics plans to deploy irrigation optimization systems on 12 golf courses this year, with a projected impact of 700-1,000 million liters of water saved per year in the long-term. All deployments utilize the Helium Network and rely on public infrastructure for connectivity and/or redundancy. Currently, Greenmetrics is expanding to other golf courses in the South of Spain.

“We still bring our own gateway when necessary, but sensors gain redundancy from surrounding areas. The main differentiation is that before, they had to resort to having big brand hardware and software set up for them. It wasn’t cost effective or scalable - the ROI didn’t match. Using Helium, we can provide cost effective solutions, have 5 years of battery, and don’t require solar, wifi repeaters, or SIM cards.”

—Tiago, Greenmetrics

Greenmetrics plans to continue developing high-impact solutions and integrate controllers that can interact directly and automatically with irrigation systems. Greenmetrics also offers a variety of solutions in the smart cities vertical such as flood detection, waste management, and water and energy metering.