Smart Livestock Hall Cooling with Edge AI and Thermovision

Challenge: How to Reduce Energy Costs on a Desert Livestock Farm

In the traditional model, all air conditioning units in the hall run simultaneously, generating enormous energy costs. The client came up with an idea: what if cooling was only activated in the zones where the cows are actually located at any given moment? The challenge was to build a system that could count animals across individual hall zones in real time and feed that data to the air conditioning control system. That is exactly the problem the client brought to us.

Solution: Real-Time Cow Detection Across Hall Zones Using Thermal Cameras

Together with the client, we designed a system using thermal imaging cameras and Edge AI. The solution detects the presence of cows in designated hall zones in real time and dynamically controls air conditioning only where the animals are actually located.

The scope of work included:

selection and testing of wide-angle thermal imaging cameras
preparation and adaptation of an Edge AI model to work with a 9-zone image division
development of a visualization application for farm staff
integration with next-generation industrial controllers (software-defined drives)
network and peripheral device configuration

The delivered system consists of:

1 thermal imaging camera monitoring 9 zones simultaneously
1 Edge AI unit with a ready-made model for cow detection, tracking, and counting
1 Raspberry Pi as a server hosting the visualization application

Demo at Hannover Messe 2025

Before the solution reaches the farm, the client decided to present it to the world. At Hannover Messe 2025, we jointly prepared a hall model divided into 9 zones. Due to the absence of cows at the trade fair, the system was adapted to count visitors at the booth – using exactly the same logic as the target deployment.

The devices counted people across individual zones in real time, passed the data to the controllers, and activated fans above each zone accordingly.

Results from the trade fair:

over 1,000 visitors in 2 days
strong interest in the approach to industrial automation
system running stably and without errors throughout the entire event

Results: Energy Reduction and Improved Animal Welfare

Thanks to the system, the client gained the ability to dynamically control hall cooling based on the actual distribution of animals. The result is a significant reduction in energy consumption and improved animal welfare, which directly translates into the quality of milk produced.

The prototype presented at the trade fair has been installed on a real farm, where it will be tested at full production scale.