Innovative Tree-Planting Robot Developed by Students

Engineering students Marta Bernardino and Sebastiao Mendonca, both 19 years old, have developed an innovative tree-planting robot named Trovador in response to the devastating wildfires that have affected forests near their homes in Lisbon, Portugal.

Since 1980, approximately 1.2 million acres of forest have been destroyed by wildfires, accounting for about 54 percent of the country's territory. With much of the affected area located in rugged terrain, traditional replanting efforts have proven challenging.

Bernardino and Mendonca created Trovador, a six-legged robot equipped with artificial intelligence, to navigate steep and dangerous landscapes and plant trees effectively. Named after D. Dinis, the Troubadour King of Portugal, who contributed to the planting of Leirias Forest, Trovador aims to restore green spaces that have become increasingly difficult to access.

Bernardino noted that around 60 percent of Portugal's green areas are in cliffs and mountains, making reforestation initiatives risky for human workers. She stated, 'We saw that existing solutions from volunteer planting to drone seed-dropping were failing to meet the scale and complexity of the problem.' Trovador differs from traditional drone-based aerial seeding, which can lead to seed wastage, by using a more targeted approach that increases the likelihood of successful planting.

The initial prototype was built in 2023 using recycled parts, costing only 15 euros and demonstrating impressive efficiency, planting saplings 28 percent faster than human workers with a 90 percent survival rate and no required post-planting care.

This advancement is crucial as Portugal has lost over half of its forest cover since the early 2000s, resulting in erosion and loss of biodiversity, particularly impacting rural communities reliant on forests for food and income.

Bernardino and Mendonca have gained recognition for their work, becoming finalists in the National Geographic Slingshot Challenge in 2024, receiving a $10,000 grant, and winning Europe's top award for Robotics for Sustainability.

Their refined prototype of Trovador is capable of climbing 45-degree slopes, avoiding obstacles, and planting up to 200 saplings per hour while analyzing soil health before planting. The robot uploads real-time GPS coordinates and soil data to a cloud platform for remote monitoring.

To make Trovador accessible for widespread use, they plan to market it as a service rather than a product for sale, allowing clients such as municipalities and NGOs to request planting services through an app.

Pricing is projected to be up to six times cheaper than manual labor and four times more cost-effective than drone methods when factoring in seed wastage. Bernardino and Mendonca aim to deploy Trovador for large-scale restoration projects by 2026, driven by their desire to restore the green landscapes of Portugal.

Bernardino expressed her commitment to replanting her country, stating, 'I built this robot as an urge to replant my country and a dream to die seeing all Portuguese green landscapes again.'