Unmanned Surface Vessels for Rapid Environmental Assessment in challenging inland waterways and tidal environments

"The use of small, affordable Unmanned Surface Vessels (USVs) as remote sensing platforms for environmental surveys promises significant gains when compared to established techniques for charting shallow-water environments. High current velocities, unpredictable flow directions, turbidity and navigational hazards or obstructions can create a difficult operational environment for sensor platforms; and often a hazardous environment for surveyors.

Safeguard Nautica has developed the micro-Rapid Environmental Assessment Vessel (mREAV) - a readily portable USV with an embedded dynamic positioning control system, mission planning system and redundant propulsion configuration with the intent of providing extended capabilities for hydrology and prospective users for whom waterborne site investigation in riverine, estuary and inland coastal environments is essential to their day-job.

Phase 1 of the Demonstrator for Robotics & Artificial Intelligence (RAI) in Extreme & Challenging Environments, enabled the consortium to integrate the main mission planning and embedded control systems into the mREAV USV. The Phase 2 follow-on project will build upon this initial progress by delivering extensive testing of two fully integrated unmanned surface systems on real-world campaigns within a variety of still water, riverine, estuary and open-water environments using a range of hydro-acoustic, photogrammetry and user-defined sensor payloads. Close consultation with background partners from the user-community will ensure validated development feedback to optimise the platform iteratively during the two-year project.

During Phase 1, consultation with the user community has revealed the value proposition and technical solution offered by mREAV for dynamic inland environments could have significant further applicability within high-energy wave and tidal work sites. In Phase 2, alongside continued development and testing of mREAV, a larger open-water variant with shared sub-systems will also be developed to operate in coastal / inshore environments. The REAV will complete two environmental survey campaigns at a UK tidal test site, providing a validated cost-reduction initiative for monitoring surveys aimed at the cost sensitive tidal energy sector, and other marine renewable energy applications within inshore waters. By operating the mREAV and REAV USVs together; the Phase 2 test plan will also demonstrate the extended capability of operating both USVs to provide relay / range extension through collaborative working at a special demonstration test in South West England.

Collectively, the spread of operational testing delivered continuously during the project will provide continued development feedback, design improvement and validated demonstration of productivity improvements and reduced survey acquisition costs, in close cooperation with end-users."