The feasibility of fully autonomous control in greenhouses

Added on 31 August 2023

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The feasibility of fully autonomous control in greenhouses

The recently completed AGROS validation trial is taking researchers another step closer to the realisation of a fully autonomous greenhouse. In the trial, an Artificial Intelligence algorithm based on Reinforcement Learning controlled the climate in a semi-commercial greenhouse resulting in a productive cucumber crop. Another milestone was marked by the successful deployment of a Digital Twin, which controlled greenhouse climate, irrigation strategy, and crop management. Anja Dieleman, AGROS project leader and researcher at Wageningen University & Research’s business unit Greenhouse Horticulture, shares a summary of the successful validation trial and its results.

“In the past two years, we worked on the building blocks for autonomously controlled cultivation of cucumbers. We determined the plant traits essential to decision-making for crop management and climate control, and chose the sensors to measure said traits. To control the greenhouse autonomously, we developed algorithms based on two approaches: a mechanistic model-based Digital Twin and a machine learning algorithm based on Reinforcement Learning,” explains Anja. Early this year saw the start of the validation trial: these two approaches and a growers reference were applied in a greenhouse trial with real cucumber crops to evaluate their performance at the WUR research facilities in Bleiswijk (the Netherlands).