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Robot atau manusia?

Crop spraying

Ground rig or crop duster (custom hire) vs Spray drone (hire, or buy and fly)

Estimasi model Whirrwork, bukan fakta. Metodologi · Rekam jejak

Manusia · Per tahunUS$17.400Ground rig (custom hire)
Robot · Per tahunUS$22.121Buy a spray drone and fly it
Masa balik modal62 bulan
Tahun titik temu biayasetelah 2035 (2031–setelah 2035)Base-case year (earliest to latest across scenarios)

On these numbers people are clearly cheaper. The robot would sit idle most of the time; it pays off at higher volume or longer hours. Payback is longer than three years, which is longer than many robot contracts and some robot companies.

Amerika Serikat · USD · BLS OEWS May 2025 national medians by SOC occupation

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Beban kerja
Asumsi

Acres sprayed per year (all passes).

Asumsi

Flying hours per spray day.

Asumsi

Spray days per month, averaged.

Asumsi

Volume is annual.

Tenaga kerja
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

BLS OEWS May 2025 national median hourly wage, SOC 45-2091.

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

Wages and salaries were 70.0% of total employer compensation cost for private industry workers in June 2026 (ECEC), so total cost = wage / 0.70.

ilostat.ilo.org

Nominal 4.4% a year, 2015-2025 (ILOSTAT hourly earnings).

Harga
extension.iastate.edu

Iowa 2025 average custom rate, self-propelled ground broadcast spraying ($5-$15).

extension.iastate.edu

Iowa 2025 average custom aerial application ($9-$16).

American Spray Drone Coalition

US average custom drone spray rate, 2025 (down from $21 in 2024).

Robot
Asumsi

Acres per drone-hour in practice, including refills and moves. Spec sheets quote more.

Southeast Drone Solutions (dealer)

DJI Agras T50 spray-ready package (aircraft alone from $19,999).

Asumsi

Extra batteries, generator, mixing trailer, certification (FAA Part 137 in the US) and insurance.

Asumsi

Yearly repairs and battery replacement, share of price.

Asumsi

Useful life in years.

Asumsi

Share of spray hours flyable (wind, rain).

Asumsi

Work lost to faults.

Asumsi

Acres a drone cannot do well (very large flat fields at high volume rates).

Asumsi

Crew minutes per drone-hour: pilot plus a mixer/visual observer.

Asumsi

Generator or grid energy per drone-hour (kWh).

Asumsi

Electricity price per kWh (USD). Check your bill; energy is rarely a big line.

Keuangan
Asumsi

Annual financing / discount rate. Nobody publishes yours; 8% is a round mid-2026 commercial borrowing guess.

Asumsi

Years in the NPV comparison.

Asumsi

Share of a human service price that is labour (rises with wages). Used to escalate and to adjust US service prices to other countries.

Asumsi

Share of a robot service price that is labour (pilot, technician). The rest is equipment, which learning curves make cheaper.

Asumsi

Share of a lease or RaaS fee that pays for hardware (learns down). The rest is service and support (moves with wages).

Download these results (CSV)

Hasil

OpsiPer bulanPer tahunPer unit (acre)Biaya awalMasa balik modalBreak-even utilisation5-year NPV vs baseline
Manusia Ground rig (custom hire) Pembanding US$1.450US$17.400US$8,70— — — —
Manusia Crop duster (custom hire) US$1.975US$23.700US$11,85— tidak pernah — -US$27.192
Robot Drone spraying service US$2.131US$25.570US$12,78— tidak pernah — -US$33.565
Robot Buy a spray drone and fly it US$1.843US$22.121US$11,06US$43.500 62 bulan 16%
Utilisation 11%
 -US$14.154

What moves the answer most

Each bar shows the 5-year NPV of the best robot option when one input moves to the low or high end of its range, with the rest held at your values.

5-year NPV vs baseline: Buy a spray drone and fly it5-year NPV vs baseline: Buy a spray drone and fly itWorkloadlow value: 300 → -US$56.087high value: 10000 → US$183.176Ground riglow value: 5 → -US$43.587high value: 15 → US$35.961Robot purchase pricelow value: 19999 → US$4.644high value: 40000 → -US$28.048Robot output per hourlow value: 12 → -US$35.685high value: 40 → -US$6.701Useful life or contractlow value: 3 → -US$24.864high value: 6 → -US$3.590Integration and setuplow value: 5000 → -US$7.154high value: 25000 → -US$27.154Maintenance per yearlow value: 0.05 → -US$7.681high value: 0.2 → -US$27.100Supervisionlow value: 60 → -US$4.451high value: 180 → -US$23.857Work that stays humanlow value: 0 → -US$11.558high value: 0.3 → -US$27.136-US$14.154low valuehigh valueSource: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/ag-spraying/). Modelled estimate, not a fact.

Cost per unit to 2035

Real terms (today's money). Robot hardware follows Wright's law; wages follow each country's history. Shaded band: robots-slow to robots-fast scenarios. Estimasi model Whirrwork, bukan fakta.

ChartBiaya manusia per unit (Dasar), Biaya robot per unit (Dasar), Biaya robot per unit (Robot: kemajuan cepat), Biaya robot per unit (Robot: kemajuan lambat). Source: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/ag-spraying/). Modelled estimate, not a fact.US$0,00US$2,50US$5,00US$7,50US$10,002026202720282029203020312032203320342035USD / acrescenario rangeBiaya manusia per unit (Dasar)Biaya robot per unit (Dasar)Biaya robot per unit (Robot: kema…Biaya robot per unit (Robot: kema…Source: Whirrwork Robot-or-Human model v1.0.0 (whirrwork.com/tools/robot-vs-human/ag-spraying/). Modelled estimate, not…

Tahun titik temu biaya: setelah 2035 (2031–setelah 2035)

What the spreadsheet misses

Keselamatan
No crushed crop or soil compaction; operators are near the chemical when mixing, as with any method.
Kualitas
Good on small, wet or irregular fields; ground rigs win on huge flat fields at high water volumes.
Fleksibilitas
Drones fly when fields are too wet for a rig.
Edge cases
Drift, label rates and tank size limit what a drone can apply.
Customer experience
Neighbours notice less noise than a crop duster.
Jobs and redeployment
Creates operator jobs; custom applicators often add drones to their fleets.
Regulasi
US needs FAA Part 107 plus Part 137 and a 44807 exemption for heavy drones, and state pesticide licences; other countries differ.

Terkait

Sumber di halaman ini

Catatan dan sumber berbahasa Inggris; versi bahasa Inggris menjadi acuan.

  1. 2025 Iowa Farm Custom Rate Survey: self-propelled ground broadcast spraying $8.70/acre average; aerial application $11.85/acre average (materials excluded) Iowa State University Extension and Outreach, 2025
  2. 2025 ASDC Impact Survey: US average custom drone spray rate $13/acre (down from $21 in 2024) American Spray Drone Coalition, 2026-01
  3. DJI Agras T50 from $19,999; spray-ready package $31,500 Southeast Drone Solutions (dealer), 2026-10 · vendor
  4. Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 (median hourly wage by occupation) U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2025-05
  5. Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026: wages and salaries 70.0% of private-industry compensation (series CMU2020000000000P) U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2026-06
  6. Mean nominal hourly earnings of employees by sex and occupation (ISCO-08), DF_EAR_EHRA_SEX_OCU_CUR_NB ILOSTAT (International Labour Organization), from national labour force and earnings surveys, 2025
  7. Labour cost levels by NACE Rev. 2 activity (lc_lci_lev): Germany 2022-2025, total labour cost vs wages and salaries per hour Eurostat, 2025
  8. Rates and thresholds for employers 2025 to 2026 (employer Class 1 NIC 15% above £5,000) HM Revenue & Customs, 2025-04-06
  9. 令和6年賃金構造基本統計調査 (Basic Survey on Wage Structure 2024), table 1 by occupation Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Japan (via e-Stat), 2024-06
  10. Average monthly earnings of employees by sex and economic activity, DF_EAR_EMTA_SEX_ECO_CUR_NB ILOSTAT (International Labour Organization), 2022
  11. Average annual wage of employed persons in urban units in 2024 (by position and by region) National Bureau of Statistics of China, 2025-05-20
  12. Outsourced drone spraying in Brazil: BRL 60-150 per hectare Planon Ambiental, 2026-10 · vendor
  13. Drone fumigation in Mexico: MXN 300-800 per hectare, application only EAVision México, 2026-10 · vendor
  14. Euro foreign exchange reference rates (cross rates to USD), via Frankfurter European Central Bank, 2026-10-23
  15. Wright, T. P. (1936). Factors affecting the cost of airplanes. Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences, 3(4), 122-128 Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences, 1936
  16. Nagy, B., Farmer, J. D., Bui, Q. M., & Trancik, J. E. (2013). Statistical basis for predicting technological progress. PLoS ONE, 8(2), e52669 (62 technologies; Wright's law among the best hindcasters; errors grow with horizon) PLoS ONE, 2013