Robotics & Automation for Soil Resilience (RASR)

土壤对我们的福祉至关重要：全球95%的粮食生产依赖土壤，土壤是四分之一陆地物种的家园，土壤在储存碳和水方面发挥着至关重要的作用，这有助于缓解气候变化和防止洪水。然而，世界各地的土壤都在退化。提高生产力和盈利能力的做法正在得到推广——投入物的精确使用、减少耕作、作物轮作、生物肥料。这些做法可以改善土壤健康，从而提高产量和作物抗逆性，最终使英国的农业食品部门在经济和生态上更具弹性（土壤协会-拯救我们的土壤，2021年）。与当前土壤采样和分析技术相关的成本和准确性阻碍了传统农业观察和监测我们最宝贵资产的方式的潜在革命。这已经得到了几位英国农民的证实，他们强烈支持这个项目。该合作项目的目的是加速土壤健康采样、监测和分析的自动化和标准化，为英国农民和种植者解锁土壤恢复力指标、提高生产力和新兴市场，并朝着净零排放的方向迈进。测量、监测和验证（MRV）土壤健康、生物多样性和碳的能力正变得越来越重要，特别是对于希望参与新的政府计划（DEFRA SFI、ELMS和BNG）和碳市场的企业。该提案发挥了各自合作伙伴的优势，E-Nano与卫星应用弹射器（RTO）、Harper Adams（学术界）等合作领导了这个联盟。io和自动发现。为了实现这一目标，土壤恢复机器人与自动化（RASR）联盟将开发一种具有成本效益的第二代全自动机器人平台，该平台可以在各种地形和农场类型中进行设计和测试，同时结合一种不确定的“即插即用”传感器有效载荷。

Soil is vital for our wellbeing: 95% of global food production relies on soil, it is home to a quarter of all terrestrial species, and it plays a crucial role in storing carbon and water, which helps mitigate climate change and prevent flooding. Yet, soils around the world are being degraded.Practices to improve productivity and profitability are being promoted -precision use of inputs, reducing tillage, crop rotations, biological fertilisers. These practices can improve soil health, which in turn improves yields, crop resilience and ultimately a more economically and ecologically resilient agri-food sector in the UK (Soil Association-Save our Soils, 2021).Cost and accuracy associated with current soil sampling and analysing techniques are holding back a potential revolution in the way conventional agriculture views and monitors our most precious asset. This has been validated by several English farmers who strongly advocate for this project.The aim of this collaborative project is to accelerate the automation and standardisation of soil health sampling, monitoring and analysis to unlock soil resilience metrics, productivity gains and emerging markets, and progress towards net zero emissions, for UK farmers & growers.The ability to measure, monitor and verify (MRV) soil health, biodiversity and carbon is becoming more important, particularly for businesses wishing to partake in new government schemes (DEFRA SFI, ELMS and BNG) and carbon markets.The proposal works to the strengths of the respective partners, E-Nano leading this consortium in collaboration with Satellite Applications Catapult (RTO), Harper Adams (academia), listt.io, and Autodiscovery.To achieve its aim, the Robotics & Automation for Soil Resilience (RASR) consortium will develop a cost-effective, 2nd generation, fully autonomous robotic platform designed and tested across a range of terrains and farm types whilst incorporating an agnostic 'plug and play' sensor payload.