Comparative Evaluation of Mobile Platforms for Non-Structured Environments and Performance Requirements Identification for Forest Clearing Applications

Abstract

The effort to automate is present across all industries. It has an economic purpose but potential impacts go far beyond economics. Research has been carried out and a lot of investment has been made in automation in a variety of industries, as well as in agriculture and forestry, which resulted in efficient solutions for diverse applications. In fact, more solutions have emerged in the field of agriculture than in any other. This can be explained in economic terms, but also in light of the complex navigation required because of unstructured environments such as forests. This paper provides a comprehensive review of existing mobile platforms and presents a comparative study for an application in forest clearing. We evaluate the size, automation levels, traction, energy source, locomotion systems, sensors/actuators availability and tools that such an application must have to succeed in its function. Hence, it will be possible to evaluate the feasibility of retrofitting an existing platform into an electric unmanned ground vehicle for forest clearing or if it is easier to start development from scratch. The evaluation results reveal that an electric unmanned ground vehicle for forest clearing is currently unavailable in the market and that a new platform is needed. The performance requirements for such a platform are identified and proposed in the paper.