Timely inspection of subsea infrastructure—particularly pipelines—is crucial for preventing oil spills and protecting the environment. This paper introduces a technology for offshore pipeline inspection centered on an autonomous robotic system equipped with underwater computer vision and edge-computing capabilities. The aim is to create a fast, cost-effective solution for inspecting underwater structures, enabling early detection of environmental hazards.
Introduction
Autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) have revolutionized the ability to explore and monitor marine environments. The cornerstone of AUV capabilities lies in their imaging systems, although the underwater environment poses unique and complex challenges for these systems.
Additional image-processing and correction ability remains a goal for AUVs, creating computational demands that must be balanced against limited onboard power and processing capabilities (Fig.
