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The Ministry of Education is looking to buy a fleet of autonomous lawnmowers for schools, as the landscaping industry gears up with Tesla-style guidance systems and AI smarts.
A ministry tender to buy up to 30 of the auto-mowers (ALMs) asked for proposals to be back this week.
The aim was to streamline maintenance and reduce the burden of property management on principals at small and rural schools, it said.
The tender shows it is part of a shake-up of caretaking, including testing out having a shared caretaker between schools and an 0800 number for urgent property problems.
"This is an opportunity to introduce your ALMs to school sites," the ministry told the industry.
Companies have been marketing automowers for large properties like schools for several years.
"We're using the same computer vision software and autonomous technology that Tesla is using in its self-driving cars," a brand director was reported as saying in an article in Landscape Management.
The mowers - typically electric - could respond to the weather, or detect areas requiring special attention, "such as diseased or under-watered patches of grass, tailoring their care to the specific needs of each section of the lawn", according to Robotics Tomorrow.
A mower could respond to the owner talking into a phone from anywhere in the world, with more to come courtesy of AI.
"Enhanced by deep learning, future robot lawn mowers will analyse vast amounts of data to make predictive decisions about lawn care," it said.
The ministry's tender said built-in safety features on mowers was a must-have and "a supplier that takes steps to reduce their environmental impact" in making mowers.
It revealed the ministry already had 30 unnamed schools on its list for auto-mowers, with fields ranging from a hectare to almost three times that.
"Eight ALM will be rolled out in schools initially, to ensure that they are fit-for-purpose," it said.
Across its 2100 schools, the ministry has 8000ha of land.
The ministry told RNZ the small schools facilities management trial was running in Waikato, to explore how "we can alleviate the property management burden for principals in small and rural schools".
"No school grounds that are currently mowed by school caretakers are included", only grounds mown by contractors.