Precision Agriculture: Technology and Economic Perspectives by Søren Marcus Pedersen & Kim Martin Lind

Author:Søren Marcus Pedersen & Kim Martin Lind
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Springer International Publishing, Cham

Keywords

Field coverageFinancial feasibilityCostRoute planningOptimisation

6.1 Introduction

Automation systems in modern agriculture are included in any kind of agricultural machinery and tractors. Many different types of technologies such as radio frequency, laser, machine vision and GPS have been tried in the navigation of agricultural vehicles (Bochtis et al. 2014; Sørensen and Bochtis 2010; Sørensen et al. 2010; van Zuydam and Sonneveld 1994). The GPS-based navigation systems are the only navigation technologies that have become commercially available for navigation of agricultural vehicles. There are two types of GPS-based guidance systems; the GPS guidance-aided systems and the fully automated or ‘hands-free’ GPS guidance systems that actually steer the tractor with the driver only supervising it. The fully automated system is capable of driving the tractor in a straight line through the field with a lateral accuracy of less than 2 cm. This system uses a very accurate real-time kinematic (RTK) GPS receiver. The RTK-GPS achieve good geopositioning accuracy of a few centimetres. To achieve such accuracy in practice, a GPS base station located close to (10 km) the mobile unit and a radio data link (Gan-Mor and Clark 2001) are required. This system can work with any field and operation, including planting, cultivating and harvest (Batte and Ehsani 2006). The position information from RTK GPS can be used not only for guidance but also for other applications such as seed mapping , controlled traffic, controlled tillage (Chesworth 2008). The RTK-GPS technology systems have been established and used in many different countries throughout Europe (mostly in Northern and Central Europe) over the last 20 years or more (Engfeldt 2005). Auto-guidance field machinery systems in parallel with GPS are used little even in Northern Europe according to recent surveys; it varies from 2 to 24% of the respondents in Finland, Germany and Denmark (Lawson et al. 2011). One of the disadvantages of the use of these technologies is the cost of management and maintenance and, of course, the cost of investment making their use more affordable for large than for small farms (Lawson et al. 2011).

Modern agricultural machinery is equipped with many controls, therefore, operator fatigue is a serious concern. Automatic guidance can reduce operator fatigue and improve machinery performance by reducing overlap or ‘skips’ during field operations such as tillage and chemical applications (Tillett 1991). With automatic guidance, companies and farmers report that they are able to carry out most field operations in row crops on flat land with greater accuracy than manually steered systems. A typical increase in field capacity is around 15%. Another advantage of the system is particularly noticeable during low-visibility conditions (night time or fog). The present accuracy in row operations can enhance the placing of chemicals in narrow bands or cultivating close to the plant line. Furthermore, use of RTK-GPS guidance to work along contour lines in hilly and rough terrain can reduce erosion and provide additional benefits (Gan-Mor and Clark 2001). Finally, by using auto-steering systems, there are many economic and environmental benefits such as lower energy consumption and lower CO2 emissions (Batte and Ehsani 2006).

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