Autonomous unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs) play a vital role in diverse underwater operations; localization is of great interest for UUVs mirroring the trend seen in self-driving surface and aerial vehicles. Unlike their land and aerial counterparts, underwater environments lack reliable Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) due to radio wave attenuation in water. Hence, alternative localization methods are imperative for both navigation and operational purposes. This study thoroughly reviews sensor technologies for underwater localization, including sonar, Doppler velocity log, cameras, and more. Different operations necessitate distinct localization accuracies and vehicle and sensor choices. Environmental factors, such as turbidity, waves, and sound disturbances, impact sensor performance. Conclusions are given on the coincidence between operational requirements and sensor specifications, with special attention to the open concerns. These considerations include aspects such as the line of sight for acoustic positioning systems and the requirement for a feature-rich environment for visual sensors. Lastly, a prediction for the future of underwater localization is given, where the tendencies indicate lower costs for sensors, making operation-specific vehicles more attractive, which aligns with an increased demand for cost-efficient autonomous offshore operations.
The oceans, covering approximately 70% of Earth's surface, play a pivotal role in climate regulation, biodiversity, and biogeochemical processes. The large and growing volume and complexity of ocean data, spanning diverse disciplines and formats, and dispersed across a wide range of sources, presents opportunities and challenges for advancing scientific research, informing policy, and addressing societal needs.
In this review paper we aim to create an easy-to-navigate map of the field of ocean data, enabling the reader to establish a broad understanding of the ocean data sector, and bridging gaps between different disciplines and levels of familiarity with ocean data. This is done through the concept of the "data ecosystem", which is used to describe the actors, organisations, and infrastructures involved in all aspects of the data value chain. We propose a structured ocean data ecosystem model as a method for comprehensive mapping of the ocean data market landscape. The proposed model consists of five key elements: stakeholders, societal elements, data sources and product offering, standards and best practices, and emerging technologies. We provide an up-to-date analysis of ocean data sources and emerging solutions and a summary of relevant data standardization efforts such as marine standards, vocabularies, and ontologies. All this will promote the development of needs-based solutions, components, products, services, and technologies, thus contributing to the evolution of the ocean data ecosystem and promoting data-based ocean research.
This paper explores the potential of using green, autonomous ships in revitalizing inland shipping in Europe against the backdrop of declining market share and the dominance of "economy-of-scale" in waterborne freight transportation. It assesses the economic and environmental viability of converting freight from road to waterborne modalities in broader business ecosystems, specifically along the Rotterdam-Ghent corridor. The analysis leverages operational and commercial insights from logistics firms, ports and terminal operators, combined with data on European goods flows by road, and accounts for operational, financial and environmental variables including realistic scenario building and ecosystem implications. Findings indicate that inland shipping in general and green, autonomous shipping in particular offer both economically and environmentally viable alternatives to road transport. The study calls for further research into green, autonomous ships from an ecosystem perspective as a potential solution to current challenges in sustainable freight transportation.
The purpose of this project is therefore to develop a software tool that can implement an automated intelligent registration (artificial intelligence) of the catch of cod on board the vessel. The project can both support the ongoing camera projects, but also functions as a forward-looking method where the concept of this approach is that the camera focuses on the catch and can be implemented without human supervision. This has a number of potential advantages, including that human supervision is avoided, the number of cameras can probably be reduced to just one (although possibly a stereo camera), labor resources are saved by automated monitoring, it will be possible to reduce the amount of data, fishermen can target selective fishing based on the information obtained, increased precision in relation to possible legal
use of the observations and overall it will reduce costs. The project supports the monitoring that has been initiated in the Kattegat, but should also be seen as a future development, including internationally, where the focus is on building monitoring/surveillance around the use of images as documentation of the catch. An extremely important element of the project is to create a high-quality dataset that can be used internationally to improve algorithms and intensify research.
GreenHopper is the first Danish zero-emission ferry developed as a test platform for autonomous waterborne navigation technologies. The paper presents technology development within the innovation project ShippingLab Autonomy, which led to the commissioning of GreenHopper at Limfjorden (DK) in December 2022. The technology research resulted in a holistic system architecture for surface vessel autonomy, based on distribution of functionality and responsibility on software modules, similar to the structure observed in the International Maritime Organization (IMO) Seafarers Training Certification and Watch-keeping (STCW) regulatory framework. The paper shows how this approach results in an architecture that supports safe behaviours of individual modules and of autonomous navigation at a system level. The paper presents the individual modules, specific features and benefits. Elements of the regulatory framework are highlighted to poise technology approval by maritime authorities. The paper reflects on lessons learned, discusses continued technology validation in dedicated operational scenarios.
Background: Autonomous ships have the potential to increase operational efficiency and reduce carbon footprints through technology and innovation. However, there is no comprehensive literature review of all the different types of papers related to autonomous ships, especially with regard to their integration with ports. This paper takes a systematic review approach to extract and summarize the main topics related to autonomous ships in the fields of container shipping and port management. Methods: A machine learning method is used to extract the main topics from more than 2000 journal publications indexed in WoS and Scopus. Results: The research findings highlight key issues related to technology, cybersecurity, data governance, regulations, and legal frameworks, providing a different perspective compared to human manual reviews of papers. Conclusions: Our search results confirm several recommendations. First, from a technological perspective, it is advised to increase support for the research and development of autonomous underwater vehicles and unmanned aerial vehicles, establish safety standards, mandate testing of wave model evaluation systems, and promote international standardization. Second, from a cyber–physical systems perspective, efforts should be made to strengthen logistics and supply chains for autonomous ships, establish data governance protocols, enforce strict control over IoT device data, and strengthen cybersecurity measures. Third, from an environmental perspective, measures should be implemented to address the environmental impact of autonomous ships. This can be achieved by promoting international agreements from a global societal standpoint and clarifying the legal framework regarding liability in the event of accidents.
A crucial component for unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs), including remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) and autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), are the thrusters, which, in addition, are sensitive to damage during operations in harsh environments. This paper presents a study on the impact of incipient faults on the performance of thruster propellers used in offshore operations. The study evaluates the reduction in propeller performance due to wear and tear under realistic working conditions. The study employs a combination of experimental data analysis and signal processing techniques, including fast Fourier transforms and harmonics analysis, to identify faults and assess their severity. The results show that worn propellers can be identified through 5th-order harmonics and rotational velocity changes. The paper concludes with a proposal for future research using a model-based approach to enhance fault detection capabilities further.
This report presents the AEGIS roadmap for automated waterborne transport and is the result of the work related to Task 2.5 Roadmap for waterborne logistics redesign as defined in the AEGIS Grant Agreement. The task was to collect the results of the AEGIS work package 2 and 6, and the AEGIS use cases, to provide a publicly available roadmap for the redesign of more sustainable waterborne transport. Furthermore, the main AEGIS solutions that can be used to realize the redesign were to be identified, and benefits and possible costs were to be described, exemplified by future transport systems, including intercontinental transport. Furthermore, the focus was to be on unitized cargo (ie, containers and ro-ro trailers).
The report is based on the AEGIS use cases and outlines one logistics redesign for short sea shipping where the cargo is containers, and one for inland waterways shipping where the cargo is roro trailers. Intercontinental transport was not studied in detail within the AEGIS project, as it was not in scope. This means that no study investigating the applicability of AEGIS solutions for intercontinental transport has been done, and thus the background for creating a roadmap for intercontinental transport is missing. Instead, intercontinental transport is briefly discussed in a separate section of the report. Furthermore, even though the AEGIS solutions do not target the deep sea leg of intercontinental transport, they are highly applicable to the distribution and consolidation of cargo in the hinterland. For this part of intercontinental transport, the short sea and inland transport roadmaps are directly applicable.
For each of the two segments short sea and inland waterways, the bassline "as-is" scenarios are discussed to provide insight into current challenges and areas with potential for improvements. Then a redesign is introduced, where the AEGIS innovations and concepts are used to gain efficiency benefits and zero emission transport systems. As part of the redesign discussion, the gaps towards realization are also discussed and identified. These are related to immature technology, certain issues that are currently not addressed and need both research and development, and issues related to uptake and investment risk. Next, one roadmap for short sea shipping and one for inland waterways is presented, and discussed in terms of short term, medium term and long term phases and what advancements need to be made (ie, what gaps need to be closed) within each of these periods. Finally, policy support and actions are discussed in terms of what will be required to realize the roadmaps.
The two roadmaps presented in this report include discussions for the short-, medium- and long-term periods. The roadmaps are structured this way to facilitate a discussion around which aspects are mature, and which require more research and has a longer expected horizon to market. The roadmaps are written with the purpose of allowing the implementation of the new transport systems in the short, medium and long term, and a discussion is made around the sustainability of the transport system at each maturity level.
This paper introduces a resilience assessment methodology for sustainable autonomous maritime transport networks developed by the European project entitled “Advanced, Efficient, and Green Intermodal Systems” (AEGIS). This problem being addressed in this paper concerns the investigation of threats, incidents, and risks in an autonomous- and sustainable shipping context, and the research question is the development of both preventive measures and reactive actions to maintain an acceptable level of operational constraints. The paper's methodology aids in designing sustainable logistics systems for highly automated waterborne transport, identifying threats and barriers to mitigate event consequences, thereby facilitating a seamless green transition. To examine the usability, this methodology is applied in a case study for cargo transportation, where we in this paper consider the maritime corridor between Trondheim and Rotterdam. The findings encompass the spectrum of possible actions to prevent and mitigate unwanted events and enhance resilience and flexibility. This can be used as a tool to respond to unwanted threats, enhance safety, and introduce new strategies. These results are deemed important as resilience is one of the prerequisites for the development of a sustainable transport system. This is true both for the companies that are engaged in the operation of such systems and for policymakers.
The implementation of unmanned vessels will evidently come with its own legal challenges. One of the most crucial of these is the identification of the role and status of the shore-based controller (SBC) for the purposes of determining liability. Different liability regimes apply different legal principles in this regard. This article will explore these issues from the perspective of English law and Scandinavian law.