Kawasaki Heavy Industries has completed a verification test for an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) in UK waters.
Developed using in-house underwater vehicle technologies, the new AUV will provide pipeline maintenance services to the offshore oil and gas industry.
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Unlike a remotely operated vehicle (ROV), an AUV does not use a tether cable to operate.
The vehicle can perform pre-assigned tasks autonomously and adapt according to its surroundings.
It can be operated without dedicated operators on the mothership or special on-board equipment.
Other operations can be performed such as charging and transmission of collected data to the mothership when the AUV is under water, reducing recovery works and additional deployments.
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By GlobalDataIt can also reduce maintenance-related costs and ensure higher safety in operations.
Kawasaki performed the verification test at The Underwater Centre, which is a marine testing, and training facility in Fort William, Scotland.
The verification test used a prototype AUV with a charging station and included automated docking of the AUV to it, contactless charging and optical communication operations.
Kawasaki intends to carry out full-scale development of a pipeline-inspection AUV in Scotland, while its control algorithms will be developed in collaboration with the UK’s Heriot-Watt University.
The company aims to commercialise the AUV by the end of the financial year 2020.
