Green management on tricky terrains: navigating where gps doesn't work

Large solar parks seem like easy sites to maintain, but in practice management is complex due to a combination of picket lines and limited satellite reception. Within the Autonomous Green Management cluster, Leeuwarden-based Vector Machines is working on technology to automate that problem. The company is developing systems that can navigate autonomously even in places without a reliable GPS signal.

"Under solar panels, GPS often works poorly or not at all," says Sander Steegstra, CEO of Vector Machines. "But that's precisely where you want to automate. That requires a different way of navigating."

Steegstra began importing robust mowing robots for sports fields and agricultural applications in 2018. "Those machines are four to five times larger than the robotic mowers people use at home. Soon the question arose whether such a system could also be suitable for solar parks."

When Vector Machines started looking into that kind of terrain, it didn't seem obvious. On a twenty-acre solar park, there are easily twenty thousand posts around which a mower must maneuver, often in places where the satellite signal is lost. "Not the mower, but the technology behind it is the most difficult part," says Steegstra. "Once the navigation works well, you can make huge strides in automation."

To make that possible, Vector Machines developed the Vector WD2.0. The system combines computer vision and various sensors to determine its position and navigate safely even without satellite reception.

That makes it possible to manage large areas autonomously where traditional GPS-guided systems fall short. On solar farms, for example, that means a mower can move autonomously along rows of panels and avoid obstacles without continuous human control.

"If you can navigate without a satellite signal for long periods of time, suddenly many more applications open up," says Steegstra. "Not only on solar farms, but also on other complex terrains."

Within the cluster, Vector Machines works closely with Batenburg Beenen. The two companies even share an employee, working alternately at both organizations to exchange knowledge. The overlap in technology is large: navigation, sensors and AI play a role in multiple applications. "It's a waste if everyone reinvents that wheel," says Steegstra. "By sharing knowledge, you can help each other move forward much faster."

Such cooperation, he says, is precisely the added value of the Autonomous Green Management cluster. Companies there do not just work side by side, but consciously try to share technological knowledge and take joint steps. "EDIH is the booster," says Steegstra. "But ultimately we have to do it together. Otherwise everyone will go back to their own island."

According to Steegstra, a strong ecosystem around autonomous vehicles and robotics is growing in the northern Netherlands. The knowledge is there, the machine builders are there and more and more companies are working on similar technological issues.

"If we combine these forces, we can really become the leader in autonomous systems for green management here," he says. "Not just for the local market, but for the entire European green space sector."

Wondering what else is happening in the Autonomous Green Management cluster?