The Institute of Technology and Renewable Energies (ITER), a company of the Cabildo de Tenerifeleads a project with drones and artificial intelligence to monitor the marine ecosystem of Canary Islands and detect possible pockets of contamination, even those invisible to the human eye. The aircraft will incorporate multispectral cameras into their flights to analyze the canary waters with the help of artificial intelligence. In a third and final phase, the algorithms will automatically detect where the contamination is and what type of discharge it is in order to treat it.
The Solar Autonomous Aerial Platform for Monitoring Pollution Events in the Marine Ecosystem project, known as Perseo, is led by ITER together with a multidisciplinary public-private consortium in the field of marine sciences and technologies formed by the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (ULPGC), the Canary Islands Oceanic Platform (PLOCAN) and the company Elittoral.
650,000
euro
- The total budget of the project, financed by different public bodies, including the EU, and private initiative, amounts to 654,779 euros. Its expected duration is 36 months.
The initiative is coordinated by the ITER Robotics Unit, has a duration of 36 months and is financed by the Ministry of Science and Innovation and the State Research Agency, in addition to the European Union within the framework of the subsequent Next Generation Recovery Plan to the pandemic and the Spanish Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (PRTR). Its budget amounts to 654,779 euros.
aerial platform.
The process pursues the development of an autonomous aerial platform for monitoring pollutants in the ocean. This platform, with zero emissions thanks to the use of solar energy to enhance its autonomy, will be equipped with different multispectral sensors and algorithms based on Artificial Intelligence (AI) integrated into electronic systems capable of executing applications in real time to monitor the maritime areas of the islands. In addition, it will include a precise positioning system that, together with a flight mission planner, will make it possible to determine the exact location of contaminants or anomalous elements on the sea surface and then predict their temporal evolution.
Detect and identify.
The objective is to detect and identify hydrocarbon spills, organic pollutants of human origin and waste from and to fish farms in the coastal marine environment. At the same time check its quality through continuous analysis of environmental parameters and aerial images. Perseus is a multidisciplinary project in which drones (UAV), artificial intelligence, sensors and marine sciences come together with the same objective. The monitoring of the marine ecosystem through the job of drones is a valuable tool to collect meteorological data, photograph marine life and the topography of the ocean floor, and monitor water quality, essential to know the state of the environment and help in decision-making for its better conservation.
“It is a very useful project because it is applicable to any coastal geography”
Advantages.
The advantages of using drones over ships or planes for ocean monitoring is that they are smaller, cheaper, and easier to maneuver. This implies that they can cover areas that are too dangerous or inaccessible to other means. They also fly longer than airplanes, allowing them to collect more data over longer periods of time. Drones can be equipped with sensors and cameras that collect data such as high-resolution images, temperature and salinity measurements, or gas concentration readings.
Three phases.
Jorge Ballesteros is the head of the ITER Robotics Unit. He considers the project “important and very useful because it is applicable to any coastal geography.” It will be developed in three phases. The first will detect contaminants. The second consists of experimenting first in swimming pools and then doing it in the sea in a controlled way. In the areas adjacent to the fish farms – the initiative is designed for aquaculture although it is extensible to any other marine environment – and in a port environment, probably that of Granadilla. Finally, in the third phase, the algorithms will make it possible to automatically know which area is contaminated and its characteristics.
