As a member of the consortium between the companies Cemosa, Cualicontrol, Rovimática, and Ingemont, and the European technology centers Tecnalia and FADA-Catec, ALTER has participated in the project carried out by Elimco Aerospace, called DREAM funded by the CDTI. This project about safe inspections, has had a duration of three years, starting in 2018 and finishing this 2021.
DREAM aimed at developing an application with drones to increase safety in the inspection and maintenance at a concise range in open and industrial spaces, proposing three specific use cases:
- safe inspections and maintenance of civil infrastructures,
- electrical installations,
- and industrial plants (petrochemical).
To demonstrate the effectiveness of these technologies, complementary technologies have been developed, such as implemented robotic arms (power line cleaning) or an intelligent navigation system for precise navigation without GPS (inspection tasks in confined spaces).
The characteristics of the drones used allow the execution of the tasks mentioned above. This new utility offered by drones in the infrastructure security sector reduces maintenance costs and is not only a qualitative leap when it comes to guaranteeing more accurate results but also increases the level of automation in this type of work. This is an added value to the UAS industry achieved by this project.
Furthermore, more efficient inspection methodologies have also been developed based on drone technology and the digitalization of information with BIM (Building Information Modeling) technology to increase the reliability and availability of infrastructures.
The demonstrators were successfully carried out in real and representative scenarios and carefully implemented by the project team. Thus, despite having to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic crisis and its consequences, the work program and milestones were met.
As specialists in the field, our experts at Alter Technology actively contributed to the project by offering their experience in drone regulation and the analysis of regulations and functional safety, and in the performance of specific tests for the types of drones that flew over the infrastructures to be inspected.
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