Rometron’s roots lay in Wageningen, The Netherlands, where its founder and owner Roel de Jonge graduated on spot spraying technology from Wageningen University and Research (WUR) in 1997. He quickly recognised the potential of the technology and started to commercialise it as WEED-IT from 1999 after founding the company Rometron.
Right from the start, Rometron and WEED-IT have been focussing on obtaining significant savings on the use of crop protection chemicals enabling farmers and contractors to save on input costs, to eliminate weed seed banks and to maximise crop moisture availability. The technology has also proven to be crucial in minimising the risk of herbicide resistances and to help minimise the environmental impact of agriculture.
The effectiveness of the detection technology was rewarded at the 2015 Agritechnica trade show with a Silver Innovation Medal.
Since 2011, Rometron is headquartered in Steenderen, The Netherlands, and develops, tests and manufacturers intelligent agricultural solutions including precision, selective and spot spraying technology. In December 2016, the 10,000th WEED-IT first generation sensor was sold and early 2021, the 10,000th WEED-IT Quadro was sold. This makes it the best-selling optical spot spraying system in the world.
WEED-IT originates from a research project at the world’s best and most renowned agricultural university, Wageningen University and Research (WUR), in The Netherlands. Following that project, the first commercial WEED-IT product was developed in 1999: the WEED-IT MKI system. This selective spraying system was developed to efficiently control weeds on pavements, roads and city squares. Weeds were detected and a solenoid was activated at the right moment to only spray the detected weed, saving 50 to 70% on herbicides.
In 2006, the successor of WEED-IT MKI, the WEED-IT MK-II system was developed. The performance and effectiveness of the chlorophyll weed detection technology was improved significantly, resulting in far higher savings on herbicide usage. Furthermore, curve control and Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) were integrated in the sensing technology. 10 years after the introduction, legislative restrictions on the use of chemical weed elimination products put an end to herbicide usage on Dutch pavements, roads and city squares. Rometron also adapted the WEED-IT technology for weed detection and elimination by means of hot water while still supplying the original 'chemical application’ to the Danish and British market. Nonetheless, the chlorophyll weed detection technology is suitable to adapt to any type of weed elimination technology including mechanical hoeing, milling and laser technology.
Following increased demand for efficient and cost-effective weed management strategies in agriculture, especially from Australian farmers, the detection technology was further developed for agricultural purposes from 2009 onwards. Called WEEDit Ag, this new system was specially designed to meet the high standards required in the rough agriculture circumstances. With increased working widths up to 36 metres (120 feet), more robustness and the capability of dealing with higher working speeds up to 25 kph (16 mph). The region of application of the WEEDit Ag system expanded over the years and covers among others Australia, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Guatemala, Paraguay, Russia, South Africa, Uruguay and the USA.
WEED-IT Quadro is the latest weed detection and elimination solution from Rometron. It incorporates 10 years of worldwide experience with the WEEDit Ag system. Quadro refers to the four detection zones of every WEED-IT detection sensor, each accounting for 25 cm (10 inches) of the entire spray boom width. The small zones with improved optics make sure the system never misses any weed. Whereas this additional accuracy is easily missed by the human eye, the new blue LED-lighting is not. Blue LED’s have proven to be more sensitive to weeds and less sensitive to background noise and thus more efficient compared to the red LED-lighting used to date. Blue is the new colour of the next generation of spot spraying technology.
Adding to the increased accuracy and efficiency is the new dual core processor for fast communication and high sampling frequency. It guarantees higher communication speeds that would be needed to enable VRA, weed and biomass mapping and working with application maps in the future.
The WEED-IT system can be built onto any brand and type of orchard sprayer, quad, ground glider & trailed sprayer, self-propelled sprayer, toolbar and even autonomous sprayers with working widths up to 36 m. You name it, we’ve built it!
