Low-cost microirrigation system supplied by groundwater: An application to pepper and vineyard crops in Spain

The PRESUD tool was developed using MATLAB™ to identify the optimum microirrigation system design. The lowest cost was determined by calculating the annual water application cost per unit of irrigated area (CT). This is defined as the cost of one cubic meter of water applied to crops, and is the sum of investment (Ca), maintenance (Cm) and energy (Ce) costs. This tool optimizes the shape of the characteristic and efficiency curves of the pump and the pumping pipe, distribution pipe, and irrigation system pipes diameters with a holistic approach.