Production, Technology

Drone technology can be used in greenhouse production By Heather Machovina

Arthur Erickson, CEO of Hylio, explained who drone technology can help greenhouse growers.

I asked Erickson why greenhouse growers would even consider using a technology that seems to be made for outdoor operations, and he explained the benefits small, indoor growers can find with drone use.

Greenhouse growers both large and small could benefit from agricultural application UAS technology. Utilizing UAS inside greenhouses is a little bit more involved than on outdoor crops. Indoor deployment involves use of GPS-denied navigation frameworks. However, despite this added layer of complexity, the benefits outweigh the costs. 

UAS are a low-cost, intrusive way that producers can automate their treatments. This allows producers to treat their crops more often and with more precision, without increasing labor costs. Smaller UAS are precise enough to target individual plants, thus even for intricate work in relatively cramped quarters, the UAS excel. 

In addition to direct treatment of the plants themselves, UAS are being utilized to apply paint coats to the outside of greenhouse structures in order to control the amount of sunlight that their crops receive. Typically, at a certain point of the growing cycle, you want to significantly diminish the amount of sunlight that the crops are exposed to; and the UAS are a much safer, faster and easier way to apply these opaque coats of paint to the greenhouse structures when compared to traditional methods. 

We expect to see UAS use increase for both indoor greenhouse crops and traditional outdoor crops.