Autonomous Ships

jackofalltrades

Tabnabs made an interesting post in this thread in the motors forum.

Tabnabs wrote: »

So, the technology of a few years ago allows a non stop 194km service (they charge it overnight, not every trip :rolleyes:)

The technology of today is building an unmanned and remotely controlled feeder ship.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VBD7hVRhx0

Once this technology is proven, they scale it up to ocean going vessels.



Within ten years this will be a reality. But perhaps you know more about Maritime Autonomous Systems and would care to refute the points?

I thought it would be a good idea to continue the conversation here.
What do people think about automation, when could we see it start to have an impact on jobs for mariners?

Cookie_Monster

A semi frequent theme in the sci-fi I read has automated sailing ships mentioned in the background. Computer & GSP controlled, sail or kite or solar powered vessels that cruise the oceans. Seems an achievable idea, especially in line with the slowdown of freight we've seen recently reducing the pressure.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/jul/25/slow-ships-cut-greenhouse-emissions

Atlantic Dawn

I think from a control of a working ship point of view they would work very well. There is though lots of variables the computers wouldn't be able to deal without humans onboard to make important decisions like collisions with semi submerged objects like shipping containers, getting ropes or fishing nets in the propellor, mechanical failure with the engine etc.

Tabnabs

Some interesting work is being done on this, including from UCC. One idea is to put a skeleton crew aboard when the ship enters "congested waters". Interesting that when out deep sea satellite communications are patchy for remotely operated control.

http://www.unmanned-ship.org/munin/about/munin-results-2/
worth a read.

draiochtanois

This post has been deleted.

dogmatix

It makes sense and I can see it happening a lot sooner then self-driving cars in the near future.

But how would an autonomous computer controlled ship react to distress calls, especially if there is no space available on board or on deck to accommodate live people?

Or how would it react to a sinking vessel full of refugees or people in the water where no radio distress call had been issued. A human crewed ship could spot such incidents but would an autonomous ship be able to?

I suspect either the software controlling the ship would have to be very advanced indeed or some form of CCTV monitoring from a remote location would be a must to cater for those scenarios.

fergal.b

As a lot of accidents at sea are caused by human error it's probably the way to go, computers assisted by humans or humans assisted by computers it's just the next step after autopilot.





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Tabnabs

Some trials in Denmark for remote operations of a tug boat.

Rolls-Royce and global towage operator Svitzer have announced that they successfully demonstrated the world’s first remotely operated commercial vessel in Copenhagen harbor, Denmark, earlier this year.

One of Svitzer's tugs, the 28-meter (92-foot) Svitzer Hermod, conducted a number of remotely controlled maneuvers. From the quay side in Copenhagen harbor the vessel’s captain, stationed at the vessel’s remote base at Svitzer headquarters, berthed the vessel alongside the quay, undocked, turned 360 degrees and piloted it to the Svitzer headquarters, before docking again.

The companies have also signed an agreement to continue their cooperation to test remote and autonomous operations for vessels. The primary systems involved will be autonomous navigation, situational awareness, remote control centre and communication.

The Svitzer Hermod, a Robert Allan ship design, was built in Turkey at the Sanmar yard in 2016. It is equipped with a Rolls-Royce dynamic positioning system, which is the key link to the remote controlled system. The vessel is also equipped with a pair of MTU 16V4000 M63 diesel engines from Rolls-Royce, each rated 2000 kW at 1800 rpm.

The vessel features a range of sensors which combine different data inputs using advanced software to give the captain an enhanced understanding of the vessel and its surroundings. The data is transmitted reliably and securely to a remote operating center from where the captain controls the vessel.

The center was designed to redefine the way in which vessels are controlled. Instead of copying existing wheelhouse design the center used input from experienced captains to place the different system components in the optimum place to give the master confidence and control. The aim is to create a future proof standard for the control of vessels remotely.

Lloyd’s Register’s Marine & Offshore Director, Nick Brown, commented: “With autonomous ships likely to enter service soon, we have already set out the ‘how’ of marine autonomous operations in our ShipRight procedure guidance, as it is vital these technologies are implemented in a safe way and there is a route for compliance. Lack of prescriptive rules was no barrier for “de-risking” the project, and we provided assurance against LR’s Cyber-Enabled Ships ShipRight Procedure, whilst considering the safety implications associated with the first closed demonstration.”

Throughout the demonstration the vessel had a fully qualified captain and crew on board to ensure safe operation in the event of a system failure.

http://maritime-executive.com/article/remotely-operate-tug-sails-copenhagen-harbor

Tabnabs

A practical step on the road to autonomy is the introduction of VR technology to ships. However for the poor old seafarer this means dumbing down their profession and reducing the need for their technical ability, skills and experience. And ultimately makes their job redundant too...

Danish technology company Virsabi is teaming up with Viking Supply Ships and MAN Diesel and Turbo on the development of a mixed reality system that will be used for onboard vessel maintenance and trouble shooting.

While virtual reality involves wearing special glasses that present an alternative reality that is disconnected from the wearer's current physical presence, mixed reality enables the wearer to see reality through glasses and in the glasses. It is similar to augmented reality, but the user is able to interact with their physical surroundings and get feedback based on that.

Virsabi is currently using Microsoft HoloLens glasses, says Borger Borgersen, Virsabi Business Intelligence Director. “Basically you are wearing a Windows 10 computer on your head. These glasses makes it possible for you to look through the glasses and orientate yourself in the real world, and we can then add information and react on the real world.”

The glasses can vision where the wearer is when entering, for example, a ship's engine room. It will identify the machinery and obtain specific information about it. The glasses can then display the maintenance history of the equipment, what needs to be done now and what safety precautions need to be taken. Instructions on what to do are given step-by-step with the glasses recognizing if particular instructions are not followed.

“All instructions on what to do can be presented by a voice or text message in front of you. So, with the glasses, you can use both hands while you get instructions, you don't need to turn away from the engine while working. And with that, you actually speed up the process,” says Borgersen.

The are fewer errors, better safety and less-skilled technicians are enabled to complete tasks that they may not be able to do alone, he says. Virsabi can add Skype call functionality, for off-site advice with the expert called able to also see what the technician is seeing. Additionally, the system makes sure that everything is recorded for warranty purposes.

This is really a radical approach, says Jens Lauritsen, Chief Product Officer at Virsabi. “Think about classic processes on board a ship with the chief engineer. If he has to do an overhaul to an engine component, he'll start his morning at his computer, he will print out a PDF manual for the overhaul. He will go to the parts storage room and get the parts that he needs. He has to remember to go back to the computer and register the fact that he's taking out these parts, so new parts are ordered. Then he goes to the engine room, and he does the work based on the PDF that he printed out. Then he has to remember when he's done with the work to go back to the computer and register the fact that he has done the overhaul.

“What we're trying to do here is take out all those switches back and forth, all those manual processes, and basically built it into the technology that he'll be wearing on his head.”

It's a technology that is relevant to autonomous ships, says Lauritsen. “I don't think it's realistic to introduce autonomous ships tomorrow. You're not going to go from having a crew of 20 people aboard a ship and then the day after, you're going to be zero on board. It's going to be a process where the specialists will disappear from ships until one day when the ship can be completely autonomous,” he says.

“With these glasses on, as a person who knows how to use a screwdriver and a wrench, you are able to do work that would otherwise require a specialist, because we can give you the instructions step by step. That means, over the next 10 years, you will be able to have less specialists on board the ships, because the people on board will be able to do the work based on the instructions they get from the glasses, or the support they can get from specialists on land.”

The prototype system is being developed with the support of the Maritime Development Center in Denmark and is funded by the Danish Maritime Foundation. It is expected to be operational this November.

http://maritime-executive.com/article/mixed-reality-technology-readied-for-offshore-vessels

Atlantic Dawn

A little more on the topic of autonomous ships...

Last month in San Diego, California, an engineer sat down at his computer and gripped a joystick on the desk in front of him. He wasn’t playing a video game – he was piloting a massive cargo ship thousands of miles away off the coast of Scotland.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170918-the-ships-that-could-change-the-seas-forever

LiamoSail

It's coming and it'll be sooner rather than later unfortunately

Tabnabs

Google now getting in on the act

Rolls-Royce has signed an agreement with Google to further develop its intelligent awareness systems, which are improving the safety of existing vessels and are vital to making autonomous ships a reality.

The deal lets Rolls-Royce use Google’s Cloud Machine Learning Engine to further train the company’s artificial intelligence-based object classification system in sensing, identifying and tracking the objects that a vessel can come across at sea.

Machine Learning is a set of algorithms, tools and techniques which mimic human learning to solve particular problems, with its methods analysing existing data sets to learn to recognise patterns in training data and to make predictions from formerly unseen data.

The Google Cloud Machine Learning Engine uses the same neural, net-based machine intelligence software powering many of Google’s products, like image and voice search.

Rolls-Royce will use Google Cloud’s software to create tailor-made machine learning models able to interpret large and varied marine data sets from Rolls-Royce.

The transport company’s maritime sector expertise will be used to prepare the data to train models, ensuring that it is relevant and of a sufficient quantity to generate statistical significance.

Within the machine learning process, the models’ predictions will be evaluated in practical marine applications, meaning that the models will be further refined.

Accessing this software through the Cloud means that the models can be developed anywhere and are immediately available worldwide.

Models can therefore be trained on large quantities of data, which will be necessary as autonomous ships become commonplace.

Commenting on the partnership, Karno Tenovuo, senior vice president for Ship Intelligence at Rolls-Royce, said: “While intelligent awareness systems will help to facilitate an autonomous future, they can benefit maritime businesses right now making vessels and their crews safer and more efficient.

“By working with Google Cloud we can make these systems better faster, saving lives.”

Rolls-Royce and Google plan on undertaking joint research on unsupervised and multimodal learning and will also examine whether speech recognition and synthesis are viable solutions for human-machine interfaces in marine applications.

The two companies will also work on enhancing the performance of local neural network computing on ships using open-source machine intelligence software libraries like Google’s TensorFlow.

http://www.portstrategy.com/news101/products-and-services/rolls-royce-and-google-sign-ai-deal?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTnpnMVl6Y3daVGxoWm1ZeiIsInQiOiJvWHlJdm9Dc1dqR2VEQTErYXptSk1saXZRWGl6dTRwcThpaUd4SzFxQWExbVA0YUV2K29yenltc1laVUpvZDVZTXRqTDBDNGFzMjYrakVNZVo0RWtVb29pWnVxYjJIVEYyOGtRRVp4ZWhtb0xMK0lFaWhcL0pjUE5mQ081bDNYNEMifQ%3D%3D

fergal.b

UK register first autonomous ship . http://www.ybw.com/news-from-yachting-boating-world/first-autonomous-ship-registered-uk-61502?utm_content=manual&utm_campaign=socialflow&utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_term=ybw

Tabnabs

The Dutch are putting autonomous boats into their canals

The Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions (AMS) has signed an agreement with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to engage in research collaboration to develop a fleet of autonomous boats for the city’s canals.

AMS will bring together a consortium of public and private partners to tackle complex urban challenges such as water, energy, waste, food, data, and mobility and in addition to MIT will join with the Delft University of Technology and Wageningen University and Research Centre to use Amsterdam as a living laboratory and test bed.

The first project that the consortium will be working on is Roboat, which is an effort to develop a fleet of autonomous boats, or “roboats,” to investigate how urban waterways can be used to improve the city’s function and quality of life. The Roboat project will develop a logistics platform for people and goods, superimposing a dynamic infrastructure over one the world’s most famous water cities.

“This project imagines a fleet of autonomous boats for the transportation of goods and people that can also cooperate to produce temporary floating infrastructure, such as on-demand bridges or stages that can be assembled or disassembled in a matter of hours,” says Carlo Ratti, professor of the practice of urban technologies in the MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning.

In addition to infrastructure and transport for the city, Roboat will also deploy environmental sensing to monitor water quality and offer data for assessing and predicting issues related to public health, pollution, and the environment. “By focusing on the water system of the city, Roboat can create opportunities for new environmental sensing methods and climate adaptation. This will help secure the city’s quality of life and lasting functionality,” says Arjan van Timmeren, professor and scientific director at AMS. He envisions a multitude of possibilities for a network of roboats, from real-time sensing of environmental factors to retrieving the 12,000 bicycles or cleaning up the floating waste that ends up in the Dutch city’s canals each year.

It is anticipated that the first prototypes of autonomous boats, or roboats will be ready for testing in Amsterdam in 2018. The project’s initial phase of testing and evaluation will last for five years.

With nearly one-quarter of the city covered by water, Amsterdam is an ideal place for developing Roboat, according to the researchers. The canal system was once the key functional urban infrastructure of the city and today still plays a major role in recreation and tourism. Amsterdam’s waters, including bridges, canals, and the river and its docks, offer plenty of opportunity to help solve current issues with transportation, mobility, and water quality.

http://www.maritimejournal.com/news101/onboard-systems/monitoring-and-control/autonomous-roboats-for-amsterdams-city-canals?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTUdObE5XUmpPRFZqTWpaaSIsInQiOiJtQ1hicVFadENnOGpxQmlPQzJNZENYOVV1anIxQU9SaHFKbmlvUmdlK1dyclY3S2ZRU09qN3pPUk9aSHJUZHl0anpUMDk2MXJvY1dwdWhzN2hGTVoxWTFBU1IyMTlKUlhDNGUyRjlxOFFjZGZFU3VqbVFUS0ZwYWFMcmh5R2p5XC9QYWFvV2RCSHJOUUN6cVRYSjdUaVhnPT0ifQ%3D%3D