SAVER - Swarming Aerial Vehicles for Emergency Response
Several Danish companies are stating that swarming UAVs have significant business potential across different application domains. The SAVER project will transfer knowledge about the latest research in emergency response tech - decentralised swarming and data merging - to these companies, while forming specific topics and consortia for future collaboration on bringing the research into full application in the industries.
SAVER - Swarming Aerial Vehicles for Emergency Response
This project will demonstrate enabling technologies for deployment of multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for emergency response. A domain with significant business potential for the companies involved, but technologies with even larger potential when sidestepped across the current business domains of the companies.
Using UAVs for rapid situational awareness is regarded as both practical and cost efficient. However, current use of UAVs within emergency response is limited by various factors, which the SAVER project seeks to address by proposessing the deployment of UAVs with decentralised swarm control.
Background
This project will demonstrate enabling technologies for deployment of multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for emergency response. A domain with significant business potential for the companies involved, but technologies with even larger potential when sidestepped across the current business domains of the companies.
As part of the climate crisis natural disasters such as floodings and wildfires are increasing in numbers and intensity throughout the world. Pressure on emergency response agencies is increasing and there is an urgent need for tools to efficiently handle emergency situations. Situational awareness is a key component in efficient disaster handling, and studies show that fast, efficient and continuous situational awareness using UAVs could decrease wildfire burn sizes and costs by up to 60%. Using UAVs for rapid situational awareness is regarded as both practical and cost efficient. However, current use of UAVs in this context is limited by:
- lack of end user adoption
- lack of fast and easily deployable solutions
- unrobust technologies with single-point-of-failures
- limited range and flight time.
This project proposes deployment of UAVs with decentralised swarm control to address issues (3) and (4). That is, operations with swarms of UAVs could significantly increase the coverable areas, while removing the single-point-of-failures related to a single-drone operations – using swarms of UAVs should result in a system where one malfunctioning UAV have no or limited effect on the overall tasks completion. Moreover, the ability for a single person or a small crew to operate several UAVs in parallel could reduce the operations cost for both emergency response and sidestepped use-cases.
Purpose / Vision
The key purpose of this project is knowledge exchange between companies and institutions which should lead to identification of knowledge and/or technological gaps that could be addressed in future research and development projects.
Although there is a specific use-case focus for this project, some technological components can be considered generic and suitable for sidestepping to other domains. Therefore, the participating companies from the Odense Robotics member list will not be exclusively companies focusing on emergency response, but also companies in the domains such as Search & Rescue, Security, Inspection & Maintenance, more generic technology providers and potentially end customers.
The project will not do direct product development or development of new services within the knowledge institutions
Expected results
The project aims to demonstrate the use of multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for emergency response, specifically for natural disasters such as floodings and wildfires. The project seeks to address the increasing pressure on emergency response agencies by providing tools for efficient handling of emergency situations. Situational awareness is identified as a crucial aspect of effective disaster management, and the project proposes the use of UAVs to provide fast, efficient, and continuous situational awareness.
Project participants
Danish Technological Institute
Technical University of Denmark (DTU)
Odense Robotics
Funding
The Ministry of Higher Education and Science has financed this project with 500.000 DKK.
Start and finish
The project runs from January 2023 to December 2023.
Contact
Do you want to get involved or hear more? Do not hesitate to reach out to Ole Georg Andersen.
Contact us to learn more
Curious to find out more about the project and how you can get involved? Get in touch with Ole.
Knowledge-based innovation and the Fehmarn Belt project