Autonomous pallet movers take over the coldest shifts in frozen-food warehouses
Robots rated for -30°C are handling pallet moves in freezer rooms that are hard to staff and hard on people.
Working inside a freezer room at -25°C means heavy protective clothing, short work periods, and frequent warm-up breaks. Frozen-food distributors have long struggled to staff those shifts, and they are becoming early adopters of autonomous pallet movers.
The newest machines use heated sensor housings and cold-rated batteries so they can run a full shift inside the freezer. They take pallets from the dock, carry them to storage lanes, and bring them back for picking, while human staff work in the warmer marshalling areas.
Doors and condensation
The tricky part is moving between temperature zones. Each time a robot leaves the freezer, condensation can fog cameras and lidar. Suppliers now schedule robots to stay in one zone where possible and hand pallets off at transfer points.
“The freezer is the one place in the building nobody asks to work. It's the obvious place to start with robots.”
- Warehouse robots
- Cold storage
- Automation
