The effects of lateral flushing on clogging of PCJ and Uniram drippers in terms of using treated wastewater

Subject Areas : Farm water management with the aim of improving irrigation management indicators

Azime Asgari ¹ , Mahdi Gheysari ² , Fateme Safarian ³

1 - M.Sc., Department of Water Engineering, Agriculture College, Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan, Iran
2 - Assistant professor at Water Engineering Department, Agriculture College, Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan, Iran
3 - M.Sc., Department of Water Engineering, Agriculture College, Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan, Iran

Received: 2014-11-30 Accepted : 2015-03-18 Published : 2015-03-18

Keywords: drip irrigation, emitter clogging, flushing, Wastewater,

Abstract :

Nowadays, the use of wastewater in irrigation of agricultural crops for the protection of water resources and eliminating the water crisis and shortages and also to reduce environmental hazards caused by increased production of wastewater has increased. Drip irrigation system is the best method for using wastewater; however, emitter clogging is the biggest problem with drip irrigation systems. Lateral flushing is one of the appropriate tasks for control of emitter clogging. The objective of this study was to investigate the amount of clogging of PCJ (2 L/h), PCJ (4 L/h), and UniRam (3.5 L/h) emitters in terms of use of treated wastewater and also to determine the effects of lateral flushing on reducing or eliminating emitter clogging. For this purpose, the changes of relative discharge rate, emission uniformity, Christiansen’s uniformity coefficient and the statistical uniformity coefficient of studied emitters for use of treated wastewater and lateral flushing, during the 504 hours of irrigation, were investigated. The results showed that the amount of emitter clogging of studied emitters in terms of use of treated wastewater was not considerable. Generally, PCJ (2 L/h), PCJ (4 L/h), and UniRam (3.5 L/h) emitters respectively with 6.4, 0.9 and 0.5 percent of flow reduction were more sensitive to clogging. Lateral flushing reduced emitter clogging. Additionally, the performance of studied emitters in the indices of relative discharge rate, emission uniformity, Christiansen’s uniformity coefficient and statistical uniformity coefficient during the test was in the range of good to very good.