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NAERINGSPH-Nærings-phd

Smart-ROV

Alternative title: Smart-ROV

Awarded: NOK 1.8 mill.

Project Number:

313866

Application Type:

Project Period:

2020 - 2024

Funding received from:

Location:

Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) are used in the oil and gas industry to perform work on subsea installations. This project aims to improve ROV operations by automating the most workload demanding tasks performed by ROV operators. The final goal of the project is the successful implementation of these results on a commercial ROV, demonstrating that ROVs can be operated in a more efficient, safe and reliable manner. ROVs are underwater vehicles equipped with thrusters, manipulators and various tools. The combination of complex operations, remote control, limited feedback and cooperation between operators results in operations that are slow and prone to human errors. By increasing the autonomy of ROVs and ROV operations, the operators can move towards supervisory roles. This can make ROV operations more efficient, safe and reliable. Among the challenges is the aim for high levels of automation. As seen with self-driving cars, this is difficult, because robots are held to a much higher standard than humans. When considering that a failed ROV operation could result in catastrophic human, environmental and material consequences, getting acceptance for commercial use of a fully autonomous vehicle is a huge obstacle. Another challenge is that the autonomous operations are very specialized, while an ROV may be required to perform custom tasks. This project approaches the automation challenge by focusing on the human factors. Specifically, we are going to focus automation efforts on the tasks that contribute to the highest total workload. One of the benefits is that the developed technology can be implemented on existing commercial ROV systems. To achieve this, the work will be centered around an existing ROV system which is placed on the seabed for extended time periods. The use of this ROV, together with an onshore control center enables close cooperation with ROV operators. This is essential if the developed systems are going to be used efficiently and successfully. An examination among the pilots at IKM Subsea revealed that the Manipulator operations are the most demanding for a pilot. The stress factor is slightly greater in the offshore control room than in onshore control room.

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Modern remotely operated vehicles (ROV) are tele-controlled in much the same way as they were when introduced for subsea operations 40 years ago. This project will apply recent advances in robotics to make ROV operations more efficient and less prone to human errors. There are currently several people involved in a ROV operation. The project will therefore start with an extensive human factor evaluation to determine how these operations are carried out in real life and how they are both facilitated and obstructed by technology. Then, based on human factors and robotics, ROV operations can be improved by increasing the level of automation, provide technological augmentation, and better situational awareness. The development will reduce the cognitive workload of the operations and the associated operational risk of human errors. The ROV will be cybernetically defined in space inside the operational envelope, giving the system explicit knowledge of it spatial location with regards to other objects of interest (e.g. a subsea well template or subsea Christmas tree). The project will have access to a resident ROV that is deployed for a major Norwegian operator company. That will be a unique and world-first way to validate the robotics development by field experiments, and is expected to be an especially fruitful approach for scientific publications that significantly extends the current technological frontier.

Publications from Cristin

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Funding scheme:

NAERINGSPH-Nærings-phd