A construction worker climbs above the fence line at the site of a large public infrastructure reconstruction project of elevated roadway and bridges in Gornji Manhattan, New York, New York, USA, April 22, 2021.
Mike Segar | Reuters
The infrastructure that makes the US, in some cases it has been flashed. More than a third (36%) of all American bridges – nearly 222,000 range – requires large repairs or replacement, according to Traffic Department data. In the meantime, more than 1,500 people were injured or died With 153 oil refineries throughout the country in six years that ended in 2023, partly because of a place that unconsciously made the damaged structure. In addition to the risk of people’s safety, the damage to oil refinery causes an increase in the already strong pollution factor. And with climate shocks that change the world and its structures with faster speeds, even the most experienced workers can be difficult to keep up. This is where robots come.
“What is the process of trying to assess physical structures such as bridges or dams or ships? It’s a very archaic method, put a man up there […] And write down all areas of potential damage, which do not work so well when you have miles and miles of potential damage, “said Jake Loosararian, executive director and co-founder Gecko Robotics.
Gecko implements robots That rise, crawling, swimming and flying, which work with sensor software and artificial intelligence to create layers of data that tell you everything you need to know about the health of the structure. All this can do without putting people in a fiery line, although they are experts who pilot robots, then make sense and act on technologies.
Geckko, who launched Loosararian’s College’s dormitory in 2013 after visiting Western Pennsylvania power plant and learned about his failures and explosions, is not the only one dealing with the infrastructure problem with robotics. Percepto offers an end solution for drones that are equipped with different types of camera and pairs with their own inspection and supervision software.
“If you are talking about the oil and gas industry, you can find gas leaks, you can find a raw oil leak and you can find broken components,” said the Udi Zohar, Chief Director of Percepti. Zohar added that his unmanned hardware can cause electric infrastructure in adverse weather conditions that people cannot (like hurricane or snowstorms, for example).
S “Save the time of people. You add safety to your company,” Zohar said. Although AERCEPTO has started with the main case of using security insurance in sensitive objects, it has spread to a number of cases of use, including precisely weak places where methane emits or triggers utilities after climate disaster.
‘I need more robots and I can’t build them all’
In Geck, data are as important as robots.
“Initially, we built a wall climbing robots that could basically do the sonograms just as the pregnancy scanning doctor does, but for a physical structure,” Loosararian said. By attaching ultrasound sensors and cameras, robots could not only approach the difficult and often dangerous videos, but could also capture information and evaluate changes over time, as well as the root causes of that change. “It begins to influence how you run certain things or how you predict how long something has to last or how safe it is,” he said.
Companies such as Gecko and Percepto target use of use that increase safety and efficiency and reduce expenditure in industries such as defense, energy and production. Work and maintenance (including property aging) count 39% of US military budgetand national total Delayed maintenance cost There may be at least $ 1 trillion, research shows. Using a robot for proactive resolution of structural assessment and priority repair as needed, companies and agencies can create a healthier, safer built world, often for less money.
Loosararian said that the robotics industry that infrastructure infrastructure grows so fast that it cannot be alone. “My problem is that I need more robots and I can’t build them all,” he said.
In the meantime, Geckko is actively active on the Ai model that predicts when the property will not succeed. Percepto, for its part, develops to include multiple types of cameras and sensors on the drone-in-box product. These two companies reflect a larger path – an industry of inspection robots grow at least speed 30% per year.
In the United States, motorists cross bridges rated in poor condition about 168 million times a day. Hundreds of workers Inspecting places fall to death every year. And in oil refineries, factors like Corrosion increases dangerous emissions This damage to workers nearby and planets as a whole, at the same time increasing operational costs.
While the much-needed experts are still looking for structural anomalies, the robots of people who manage them-manage them to fill in a clear gap for a safer, healthier world.
