The Department of National Defence (DND) is looking for a contractor to develop designed-in-Canada robots that can locate underwater mines.

But it’s not sharing many details.

The IJF learned of DND’s intentions to develop the robots through four tenders posted on the federal procurement website and shared in the IJF’s procurement database. The documents say DND is looking to “develop a Canadian-designed, remotely controlled and autonomous mine countermeasures (MCM) uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) capable of surveying the ocean floor to detect, locate and identify underwater mines.”

A national security exception has been applied, which means DND intends to keep some aspects of the contracts secret, though it’s not clear why or to what elements of the contract the exception is being applied.

One month ago, the IJF asked DND for more information on the tenders, including how many vehicles DND was looking to develop or buy, where DND plans to use the uncrewed vehicles and to what aspects of the tenders the security exception was being applied. A spokesperson initially said the scope of questions “involves multiple groups within the department and is taking longer to co-ordinate.”

Despite multiple follow-up requests, DND did not answer the IJF’s questions.

What DND, and the Navy, specifically, has said publicly is that it’s interested in exploring how autonomous systems can protect Canadian waters.

A September article in The Maple Leaf, an in-house DND publication, highlighted the value of using autonomous systems in mine countermeasures.

"Taking the person out of the minefield is what we're looking to do on the autonomous side," Commander Greg Atkinson, section head for remote and autonomous systems with the Royal Canadian Navy, said in the article.

“The goal is to conduct the full spectrum of mine countermeasure activities, from detection and identification to destruction, from a safe distance from the mine danger area."

The article said researchers are conducting trials to see how unmanned systems could work in “realistic maritime conditions.” It references specific challenges with such systems under ice in the Arctic, where weather conditions can be harsh.

Underwater mines have been in the news recently, with Iran saying last week that a cargo ship sank after hitting a naval mine in the Strait of Hormuz. In March, after reports Iran laid about a dozen mines in the strait, the U.S. claimed it had "eliminated" 16 Iranian mine-laying vessels. In August, Trump claimed all mines had been cleared from the strait.

It’s unclear what specifically the Canadian-designed mine-finding robots will be used for, including if they’d be able to destroy mines.

The DND tenders state the contracts are “designed to support an iterative and incremental approach to meet Canada’s unique operational requirements.”

The deadline for submissions was Oct. 8, according to the tenders posted on the government’s CanadaBuys procurement site.

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