Continuing to enable the use of emerging breakthrough technology, TotalEnergies has partnered with iXblue to demonstrate collaborative uncrewed capabilities for subsea inspection and asset survey operations. This partnership aims to advance new technology for surface and subsea vehicles that are uncrewed within the energy sector.
Successful Offshore Trials
Teams recently conducted successful trials off the coast of La Ciotat (South of France), deploying two uncrewed platforms: iXblue DriX Uncrewed Surface Vehicle (USV) and Teledyne Gavia Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV). They remotely controlled and supervised both platforms from the iXblue Onshore Control Center, with the iXblue DriX USV serving as a communication gateway between the onshore control center and the Gavia AUV. The two drones were able to successfully communicate together, thanks to the Gaps USBL positioning system installed within the DriX gondola, and that tracked the Gavia AUV in this setup using subsea and surface vehicles, which remain uncrewed throughout the mission.
Enhancing Safety and Operational Efficiency
“With these sea trials, we were able to successfully demonstrate the combination of two light drones working in a collaborative mode, remotely controlled and supervised from the shore. Thanks to the DriX USV, we were able to track the Gavia AUV and send it new mission plans to allow the AUV to closely inspect some defined subsea features, all from the safety of the onshore control center,” explains Mathieu Lardeux, R&D Project Manager at TotalEnergies. In fact, the use of surface and subsea vehicles operating uncrewed leads to safer operations and greater efficiency.” “This opens up great possibilities for future multi-energy offshore developments. Replacing the use of conventional large, crewed inspection and survey vessels with uncrewed solutions such as the DriX USV will allow us to reduce offshore risk for personnel, decrease operational costs and lower the carbon footprint of our offshore operations.”
Expanding Future Applications
“We are delighted to have been able to demonstrate our capability to conduct collaborative surface/subsea autonomous vehicles operations to TotalEnergies. This broadens the range of applications of our DriX USV, and especially for deeper waters operations, where the use of AUV is necessary. Looking ahead, as uncrewed surface and subsea vehicles become more common, even broader applications may be possible. We now look forward to the next steps in our collaboration and to conduct an operational survey on one of TotalEnergies Offshore field in the near future,” adds Olivier Cervantes, VP Energy Markets at iXblue.
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