SBIR Phase I: One pass dike and levee characterization system

这个小企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目将开发堤坝表征系统。卡特里娜飓风和丽塔飓风以及2008年中西部的洪水和堤坝决口清楚地表明了美国堤坝失效的影响，以及主动堤坝评估和修复的必要性。 目前的堤坝评估方法是昂贵的，侵入性的和漫长的，通常只提供稀疏的数据。将在该SBIR下开发的系统将提供关于堤坝的地下和表面特性的价值和变化的接近真实的时间的可操作信息。这将通过半自主地收集和处理空间和时间上一致的多传感器数据集来完成。数据处理将通过多传感器数据集的联合反演和自动解释来完成。信息将通过网络界面提供给堤防和堤坝的利益相关者，并将允许利益相关者根据财产价值和变化对纠正措施的必要性做出知情和基于数据的决定。该系统将大大改善堤坝评估实践。该项目更广泛的影响/商业潜力将是提供质量更高的堤坝表征，成本比当前方法低得多，以及堤坝性能的相关信心。在美国和其他国家，如荷兰、英国、中国和日本，堤坝和堤防共同保护着数千万人的生命和价值数万亿美元的财产。目前，堤防和堤坝的评估费用在每英里5万至30万美元之间。由于美国堤坝库存超过100，000英里，评估这些堤坝和堤坝的成本给联邦政府、州和社区带来了巨大的困难，并且预算限制有时会导致延迟评估，从而带来潜在的致命和昂贵的后果。将在这里开发的系统将在近真实的时间内提供高质量、可负担得起的（约3000美元/英里）、易于访问的堤坝地下和表面特性的综合信息。这将使利益相关者能够就堤防质量以及任何纠正措施的需要和位置做出明智的决定。由此产生的关于堤坝强度的科学和数据知识将为社会提供广泛的利益。

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will develop a dike and levee characterization system. Hurricane Katrina and Rita and the flooding and breaching of levees in the Midwest in 2008 clearly demonstrated the impact of levee failures in the US, and the need for proactive levee assessment and repair. Current approaches to dike and levee assessments are expensive, invasive and lengthy and generally only provide sparse data. The system which will be developed under this SBIR will provide actionable information in near real time on the values of, and changes in, subsurface and surface properties of dikes and levees. This will be done by semi autonomously collecting and processing spatially and temporally coincident multi sensor datasets. Data processing will be done through joint inversion and automated interpretation of multi sensor datasets. Information will be made available to stakeholders in dikes and levees through a web interface, and will allow stakeholders to make informed and data based decisions on the need for corrective actions based on property values and changes. This system should substantially improve dike and levee assessment practices.The broader impact/commercial potential of this project will be the potential to provide dike and levee characterization with improved quality and for substantially lower costs than current approaches, and the associated confidence in levee performance. In the US and in other countries such as the Netherlands, the UK, China and Japan levees and dikes collectively protect tens of millions of lives and trillions of dollars' worth of property. Currently dike and levee assessment costs between $50,000 and $300,000 per mile. As the US levee inventory is over 100,000 miles, the costs to assess these dikes and levees pose significant hardship for the federal government, states and communities, and budget constraints sometime result in deferred assessments with potential deadly and expensive consequences. The system which will be developed here will provide in a single pass high quality, affordable (approximately $3000/mile), readily accessible comprehensive information on dike and levee subsurface and surface properties in near real time. This will allow stakeholders to make informed decisions on dike quality and the need for, and location of any corrective actions. The resulting science and data based knowledge about levee strength will provide broad benefits to society.