Weed Control with Robots: No weeds in the Row
Saxion's SMART and Aeres Precision Agriculture research groups, together with agricultural and technical SMEs, bundle their knowledge to develop techniques that allow small robots to automatically remove weeds without using herbicides. These techniques enable growers to grow crops sustainably, without emissions and residues. Selective row weed removal has been identified as the next step in autonomous weed control.
There is an increasing social and political concern about the impact on humans, animals and the environment due to the use of herbicides (crop protection products) in agriculture. There is a widely supported ambition in the Netherlands to make crop protection more sustainable, to limit the emission of harmful substances and to cultivate healthily and sustainably with an economic perspective. Design-oriented research is used as a research method to answer the following research question: “Which robotisation techniques can be further developed within 2 years into technically new applications for demonstrable autonomous agro-production systems, so that the use of herbicides for strip cultivation can be significantly reduced? “
Using an iterative design process, students and researchers explore and test various methods of mechanical weed removal. The research focuses on weed removal in the row, close to the crops. Touching weeds with a heated element seems a viable solution for precision weed removal, without disturbing the soil. Soil disturbances may cause new weeds to start growing, hence keeping the soil at ease is of importance. Within the project, a T-bot robotic platform has been developed with a heated element as the end-effector. This allows for precise movement of the tool, planning and navigating around crops. It also compensates for the driving direction of an autonomous agricultural robot while the heating element ”touches” the weeds for a brief time. Currently, the system is tested and prepared for integration with a commercially available robot (AGV).
Project results
The objectives of the consortium are aimed at developing technical applications that are compatible and can be integrated with current commercially available robots (AGVs). The results are techniques that have been tested and validated in the field and will contribute to more sustainable food production.
