Case Study: California avocado farmer Kurt Bantle slashes water costs with Spirent IoT

IoT Enables Avocado Farmer to Recover Investment in ConnectedHardware in Less than Six Months by Slashing Water Consumption

The customer, an avocado farmer named Kurt Bantle, faced the challenge of exorbitant water costs for his 900-tree grove in drought-stricken California. To address this, he implemented a solution using connected hardware and a Spirent partner Oasis SIM to automate irrigation.

The Spirent solution utilized LoRa stations with soil moisture sensors and cellular backhaul to enable just-in-time watering. This led to a 75% reduction in his annual water bill, slashing it from $47,336 to $11,834. The $8,200 hardware investment was recovered in less than six months, though the efficiency also resulted in the farmer being placed under state surveillance for suspected meter tampering.