NOVEL INDUSTRIAL APPLICATIONS OF AGILE MOBILE ROBOTICS

Abstract

Ontario Power Generation (OPG) currently has agile mobile robots deployed at several sites for both R&D related work and to leverage their ad hoc deployment for emergent issues. The primary system leveraged for OPG’s work with this new technology has been Boston Dynamics’ Spot robot platform.

Current deployments are focused on safety enhancements where the robot can provide a remote survey of work-site risks for planning purposes or by performing a task directly in lieu of an elevated risk to the worker. OPG’s internal enterprise innovation team (X-lab) has responded to these ad hoc and time-sensitive requests which have generated invaluable operating experience and contributed to the continued evolution of the Spot platform.

Several use cases are discussed in detail, including radiation survey, and circuit breaker rack-out missions. The successful application of Spot to several emergent issues has resulted in significant savings and influenced OPG’s decision to procure five robots for both current and developmental use cases across its fleet of generating stations.