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New Autonomous Farm Wants To Produce Food Without Human Workers (technologyreview.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from MIT Technology Review: Iron Ox isn't like most robotics companies. Instead of trying to flog you its technology, it wants to sell you food. As the firm's cofounder Brandon Alexander puts it: "We are a farm and will always be a farm." But it's no ordinary farm. For starters, the company's 15 human employees share their work space with robots who quietly go about the business of tending rows and rows of leafy greens. Today Iron Ox is opening its first production facility in San Carlos, near San Francisco. The 8,000-square-foot indoor hydroponic facility -- which is attached to the startup's offices -- will be producing leafy greens at a rate of roughly 26,000 heads a year. That's the production level of a typical outdoor farm that might be five times bigger. The opening is the next big step toward fulfilling the company's grand vision: a fully autonomous farm where software and robotics fill the place of human agricultural workers, which are currently in short supply. Iron Ox uses software, dubbed "The Brain," to watch over the farm and monitor nitrogen levels, temperature, and robot location. Alexander hopes to automative every process of the farm, but human workers are currently needed to help with seeding and processing the crops. He cites the shortage of agricultural workers and the distances that fresh product currently has to be shipped for reasons why we need automated farming.
"The problem with the indoor [farm] is the initial investment in the system," says Yiannis Ampatzidis, an assistant professor of agricultural engineering at the University of Florida. "You have to invest a lot up front. A lot of small growers can't do that." Currently, Iron Ox is sending the food it produces to a local food bank and to the company salad bar.
"The problem with the indoor [farm] is the initial investment in the system," says Yiannis Ampatzidis, an assistant professor of agricultural engineering at the University of Florida. "You have to invest a lot up front. A lot of small growers can't do that." Currently, Iron Ox is sending the food it produces to a local food bank and to the company salad bar.
I've always wondered if robots could patrol for weeds and bugs on a farm
There are a few small weed-bots for home gardens.
There are also a few commercial products for farms.
There are many research projects at universities. I saw one in action at UC Davis last year. It seemed to work very well, and I have no idea why they aren't commercializing it.
Some of the weed-bots pull or zap the weeds. Others use piezoelectric sprays, like in your inkjet printer, to dispense small amounts to glyphosate directly onto the leaves of the weeds, getting none on the crop or ground, and reducing usage by 95%.