DexROV: Dexterous Undersea Inspection and Maintenance in Presence of Communication Latencies

Underwater inspection and maintenance (e.g. in the oil & gas industry) are demanding and costly activities for which ROV based setups are often deployed in addition or in substitution to deep divers - contributing to operations risks and costs cutting. However the operation of a ROV requires significant off-shore dedicated manpower to handle and operate the robotic platform. In order to reduce the burden of operations, DexROV proposes to work out more cost effective and time efficient ROV operations, where manned support is in a large extent delocalized onshore (i.e. from a ROV control center), possibly at a large distance from the actual operations, relying on satellite communications. The proposed scheme also makes provision for advanced dexterous manipulation capabilities, exploiting human expertise when deemed useful. The outcomes of the project will be integrated and evaluated in a series of tests and evaluation campaigns, culminating with a realistic deep sea (1,300 meters) trial.