Imagine your farm is like a neighborhood where every house has different needs — some need more water, some need more nutrients, some are fine. Right now, most farmers treat the whole field the same, which wastes a lot of water and fertilizer. Green-DROP is like giving each patch of your farm its own personalized care plan, using maps, soil data, and weather info to deliver exactly the right amount of water and nutrients to each spot. On top of that, it takes waste from animal farms and biogas plants and recycles those nutrients back into the fields, closing the loop instead of paying to dump them.
European farmers face rising water and fertilizer costs while dealing with increasingly unpredictable rainfall patterns. At the same time, agricultural waste like manure and biogas digestate is expensive to dispose of, even though it contains the same nutrients farmers are buying as commercial fertilizer. Current irrigation systems treat entire fields uniformly, wasting resources on areas that need less while starving areas that need more.
Green-DROP built a precision fertigation system that uses georeferenced data layers (crop type, topography, weather, soil type, field capacity) to calculate and deliver exact water and nutrient amounts to each subarea of a farm. The project produced 13 deliverables including physically constructed and installed system parts, confirming that hardware was built and deployed.
If you are a farm or cooperative managing 50 hectares or more and struggling with rising water and fertilizer costs — this project developed a precision fertigation system that uses georeferenced field data to deliver exact water and nutrient amounts to each subarea. The system reduces water and fertilizer consumption by 20%, directly lowering input costs while maintaining or improving yields.
If you are a biogas plant or livestock operation spending heavily on disposing of digestate, manure, or sewage sludge — Green-DROP developed a way to recover nutrients from these waste streams and use them as fertilizer input. Instead of paying disposal fees, your waste becomes a resource that feeds back into agricultural production, closing the nutrient cycle.
If you are an irrigation equipment company looking to move into precision agriculture — Green-DROP built and installed a working fertigation system that combines georeferenced crop, soil, topography, and weather data to automate subarea-specific irrigation. This is a proven integration of sensors and control systems that could be licensed, white-labeled, or distributed through existing dealer networks.
According to the project data, Green-DROP reduces water and fertilizer consumption by 20%. For a farm spending €50,000 annually on these inputs, that translates to €10,000 in yearly savings — though actual results depend on crop type, soil conditions, and local water costs.
Green-DROP was specifically designed for farms of 50 hectares and larger, targeting holdings and agricultural cooperatives. The project produced a demo deliverable described as 'Constructed and installed system parts,' indicating physical hardware was built and deployed in real conditions.
The project was run entirely by HYDRO-AIR INTERNATIONAL IRRIGATION SYSTEMS GMBH, a German SME that is already an irrigation systems company. All IP likely sits with this single company. Licensing or distribution partnerships would need to be negotiated directly with them.
Green-DROP uses georeferenced layers including crop type, topography, weather distribution, field capacity, and soil type. These data layers are combined to calculate precise water and nutrient requirements for each subarea of the holding.
Yes. The system is designed to recover nutrients from farming wastes — specifically manure from animals, digestate from biogas plants, and sewage sludge — and use them as fertilizer input. This closes the nutrient cycle: waste nutrients become plant nutrients.
The project ran from April 2018 to December 2020 and is now closed. However, HYDRO-AIR is an active irrigation systems company based in Germany, so the technology is likely being commercialized or integrated into their product line. Based on available project data, the current commercial status would need to be confirmed directly.
This is a single-company project — HYDRO-AIR INTERNATIONAL IRRIGATION SYSTEMS GMBH from Germany, a private-sector SME that already manufactures irrigation systems. The 100% industry consortium with zero university or research partners tells a clear story: this is not academic research looking for applications, it is a commercial company building a product. The SME Instrument Phase 2 funding confirms the EU evaluated this as market-ready enough to invest in scaling. For a potential buyer or partner, this means you would be dealing directly with the company that both developed and owns the technology, with no complex multi-partner IP negotiations.
HYDRO-AIR INTERNATIONAL IRRIGATION SYSTEMS GMBH is based in Germany. Contact their business development team through the company website.
Want an introduction to the Green-DROP team? SciTransfer can arrange a direct meeting to discuss licensing, distribution, or integration opportunities.
