Multi‐UAV Systems for Inspection of Industrial and Public Infrastructures

Abstract

This chapter analyses the application of systems with multiple aerial robots to the inspection of large infrastructures. These applications involve long-range flights and also detailed close views to achieve high accuracy in the inspection of some elements, thus leading to heterogeneous multi-UAV systems. Taking into account range and time of flight constraints, stations to recharge the batteries of the UAVs are required. In particular, the inspection of a grid of electrical power lines is considered in this chapter with two use cases: periodic detailed inspection and 3D modeling of the power lines and localization of faults in the grid that cause power outages in a given area. This chapter addresses the multi-UAV planning techniques required to solve this application. In addition, since the distance from the vegetation to the power lines is a very relevant parameter during the inspection, this chapter also presents a semantic mapping method that can be run onboard the UAVs to compute online the vegetation map near the electrical lines. Both the planning and the mapping techniques have been integrated in an inspection system that has been successfully validated in the ATLAS UAV Experimentation Center of FADA-CATEC in Villacarrillo (Jaen, Spain) in the framework of the H2020 AERIAL-CORE project. This chapter also includes these validation results that have pointed out the interest of the presented techniques for the industrial application.