Electric Sheep – an artificial intelligence and robotics company specializing in large-scale landscaping operations, has announced a new autonomous robot to its fleet – Verdie. This electric robot can work alongside Electric Sheep’s other products and landscapers to perform edging, trimming, and even blowing. Verdie also looks quite cute doing it. Check it out.
Before you see Verdie in action, you should get to know the minds behind the new landscaping robot. Electric Sheep Robotics (ESR) is a San Francisco-based AI and robotics company funded by Tiger Global and Foundation Capital.
Focusing on a unique segment using tech to support outdoor maintenance providers, Electric Sheep has developed and implemented a growing lineup of robots that can autonomously mow alongside humans as they perform other duties in the yard.
The company’s technology is centered around ES1 – its proprietary AI software agent that utilizes real-world models to enable reasoning and planning while working in yards. This GenAI has already successfully been implemented in Electric Sheep’s electric mowing robot – RAM.
Today, Electric Sheep has announced a new member of the landscaping robot family that can work seamlessly along the RAMs – meet Verdie.
Source: Electric Sheep Robotics
Verdie the electric landscaping robot is here to work
Imagine a future where your lawn is in dire need of maintenance on a sweltering August afternoon, but your pool or shaded patio is calling your name instead, so you leave the work to your landscaping robots. Thanks to innovations from Electric Sheep Robotics, that future is a reality.
The AI specialist launched Verdie today – an all-electric autonomous robot that utilizes ESR’s ES1 AI to put all the finishing touches on a freshly cut lawn; whether a robot or your teenager does that work is up to you.
ESR’s AI enables the RAM mower and Verdie to work together simultaneously “out of the box” with zero teaching necessary. It is designed to navigate and learn the environment around them using only artificial intelligence. Per the release:
To accomplish these tasks ES-1 needs to understand the semantics of the world, create a map that can be used for coverage planning, and highlight the edges of the workable area, in this case, trimming, edging or mowing grass. ES1 achieves this through dense prediction of a world state with a single model, this is akin to ChatGPT for language but for spatial AI.
Electric Sheep states that its full-stack data channel and existing volume of data enables landscaping crews, campuses, HOAs, or residential customers to deploy the robots without any need for an engineer present. Furthermore, the software allows the robots to continuously learn and train for various tasks around a given yard.
ESR says it is currently operating a fleet of 40 RAM mowers around the US and will deploy the Verdie landscaping robots to commercial and residential customers in Q2 2024. As promised, here’s a video of Verdie in action:
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DHL Express has more than 10,000 eSprinter vans in its global delivery fleet, but none of those have been deployed in North America – until now, that is! The company recently added 45 new Mercedes eSprinter panel vans, and they’ve got plans for plenty more!
While Mercedes offers its eSprinters with a promised 206 mile estimated range, DHL says it’s consistently seen them exceed 240 miles in stop-and-go delivery duty, making them the longest-range battery electric vehicles in DHL’s US fleet.
And, of course, the eSprinter will do all of that without the noise, vibration, and harmful carbon emissions of diesel.
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“Electrifying our fleet is one of the most visible and impactful ways we are moving toward a more sustainable future,” explains Greg Hewitt, CEO of DHL Express, US. “The Mercedes-Benz eSprinter brings an extended range and proven cargo capabilities that allow us to serve our customers with zero emissions, while also advancing our global goal of more sustainable logistics. These vehicles not only strengthen our operations in major US cities but also set the stage for future electric fleet growth across the Americas.”
The 45 eSprinters will see deployment in Chicago, Indiana, and Pittsburg, and will act as a first step DHL’s global Sustainability Roadmap, which will see the company electrify 66% of its last-mile US delivery fleet (and some of its long-haul fleet operations) by 2030.
In short, they’re doing the right thing – or seem to be, anyway. Whether or not that commitment to decarbonization will win them more American customers remains to be seen.
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Enphase Energy just launched a new off-grid system that lets homeowners power their homes without a utility connection – even for extended periods. The California-based Enphase says the off-grid setup delivers a seamless way to live independently from the grid while still using solar, batteries, and a standby AC generator.
A full off-grid setup
The new system combines Enphase’s IQ Battery 5P with embedded grid-forming microinverters, IQ8 Series Microinverters with Sunlight JumpStart, and a third-party standby AC generator. The components work together to supply power to a home and automatically manage energy sources to maximize efficiency and reliability.
If the batteries are drained and the generator runs out of fuel, the Sunlight JumpStart feature can automatically recharge the batteries the next morning once the sun comes up.
The IQ Battery 5P delivers 3.84 kVA of power per 5 kWh of capacity, and systems can be scaled up to 40 kWh and 15.4 kVA. That’s enough power to start big household appliances like HVAC systems or water pumps. The IQ System Controller 3G provides the backbone, managing solar, batteries, and generator inputs to deliver up to 46 kVA of off-grid power.
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Smarter control and connectivity
Each system connects to the cloud through Enphase’s IQ Combiner 5C HDK, which bundles solar interconnection, communications, and metering into one box. For homes without reliable broadband, the built-in 4G LTE Cat 4 modem keeps the system online for monitoring, firmware updates, and remote support.
Homeowners can manage everything from the Enphase App – from solar generation and battery status to generator integration and load control.
Why it matters
As grid outages become more common and homeowners look for ways to gain energy independence, off-grid systems like this are becoming more appealing.
“With the launch of our off-grid solution, we are giving homeowners a reliable path to complete energy independence,” said Nitish Mathur, Enphase’s SVP of customer experience. Enphase says over 100 homes are already operating entirely off-grid using its technology. The company plans to expand availability beyond the US in 2026.
The 30% federal solar tax credit is ending this year. If you’ve ever considered going solar, now’s the time to act. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
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Global offshore wind targets are still strong enough to triple global capacity by 2030, despite the US’s offshore wind stagnation under Trump. A new analysis from energy think tank Ember and the Global Offshore Wind Alliance (GOWA) shows that the rest of the world is charging forward, underscoring confidence in offshore wind as a cornerstone of future clean energy systems.