Welcome to Journal of Automotive Safety and Energy,

Journal of Automotive Safety and Energy ›› 2024, Vol. 15 ›› Issue (5): 670-679.DOI: 10.3969/j.issn.1674-8484.2024.05.005

• Intelligent Driving and Intelligent Transportation • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Intelligent inspection method for power transmission towers, substations, and distribution poles using fixed UAV nests

HUANG Zheng1(), WANG Hongxing1, DU Biao1, GAO Song1, GAO Feng2,*()   

  1. 1. State Grid Jiangsu Electric Power Co., Ltd., Nanjing 210024, China
    2. School of Transportation Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 102206, China
  • Received:2024-08-17 Revised:2024-09-18 Online:2024-10-31 Published:2024-11-07

Abstract:

To achieve automated inspection of power transmission towers, substations and distribution poles, a fixed unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) nest was proposed based strategy that accounts for varying inspection frequencies. A fixed UAV nest deployment model was established based on a set cover problem, and the task assignment model for inspections was developed by enhancing the k-means clustering algorithm. The UAV path planning problem was formulated as a Multi-trip Traveling Salesman Problem with Time Windows (MTSPTW), and solved with an Adaptive Large Neighborhood Search (ALNS) algorithm. The real-world data validation was verified by utilizing a real operational and maintenance environment as an example. The results show that a single UAV nest completes 1 838 mixed inspection tasks over one month, with 130 takeoffs and a total flight distance of over 703 km. The proposed method overcomes the limitations of single-type inspections, proving effective for large-scale scenarios.

Key words: unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), power inspection, UAV nest deployment, task allocation, path planning, adaptive large neighborhood search(ALNS)

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