I-Corps: Determining Excavator Proximity to Buried Utilities

挖掘机无意中撞到了埋在地下的公用设施（例如，煤气管、水管、电缆等）在美国，每60秒就会发生一起死亡、受伤和财产损失的事件，每年造成数十亿美元的损失。据广泛记载，这些事故的发生要么是因为挖掘机操作员不知道公用设施埋在哪里，要么是因为他们不能感知公用设施相对于挖掘挖掘机的位置。开发的技术使挖掘机操作员能够持续看到挖掘机附近埋有什么公用设施，从而有助于防止涉及公用设施罢工的事故。它还允许监测工作挖掘机接近邻近的被埋资产，从而创建基于真实的时间知识的挖掘机操作和控制的能力。该技术试图商业化，试图从先前NSF支持的地理参考增强现实可视化，设备监控和几何邻近解释研究中转换基础知识，并将其整合为挖掘机空间感知和操作员知识。开发的技术的商业化是至关重要的，因为涉及挖掘机撞击被埋公用设施的事故是一个长期存在的重大社会问题，扰乱了日常生活和商业，每年可能导致死亡，受伤，财产损失和其他成本。该项目将有可能将挖掘机操作和控制从主要基于技能的活动转变为基于知识的实践，导致生产率和安全性的显著提高。这反过来将有助于实现巨大的成本节约和减少对公民的潜在危害，提高行业竞争力，并降低地下基础设施的生命周期成本。在制造业、运输业、采矿业和造船业等领域，从以技能为基础的过程向以知识为基础的过程过渡被视为具有价值，这些领域也将产生这种好处。

An excavator unintentionally hits a buried utility (e.g., gas pipe, water main, electric cable, etc.) every 60 seconds in the US causing fatalities, injuries, and property damage, that together cost billions of dollars each year. It is widely documented that these accidents occur either because excavator operators do not know where utilities are buried, or because they cannot perceive where the utilities are relative to the digging excavator. The developed technology allows excavator operators to persistently see what utilities lie buried in a digging machine's vicinity, thus helping prevent accidents involving utility strikes. It also allows the monitoring of working excavator proximity to vicinal buried assets, thereby creating the capability for real time knowledge-based excavator operation and control. The technology sought to be commercialized attempts to transition fundamental knowledge from prior NSF supported research in georeferenced augmented reality visualization, equipment monitoring, and geometric proximity interpretation, and integrates them for excavator spatial awareness and operator knowledge. Commercialization of the developed technology is critical because accidents involving excavator hits to buried utilities is a long-standing and significant societal problem that disrupts daily life and commerce that can lead to fatalities, injuries, property damage, and other costs each year.This project will potentially transform excavator operation and control from a primarily skill-based activity to a knowledge-based practice, leading to significant increases in productivity and safety. This is turn will help realize enormous cost savings and reduction of potential hazards to citizens, improvement in industry competitiveness, and reduction in life cycle costs of underground infrastructure. Such benefits will also accrue in fields such as manufacturing, transportation, mining, and ship-building where the transition from skill-based to knowledge-based processes is seen to be of value.