UK partnership gets additional funding for seabed mapping project
March 1, 2023
Uncrewed surface vessel will get enhanced robotics, data solution systems.
Courtesy HydroSurv
The HydroSurv REAV-28 USV at Cawsand Bay, Cornwall, UK.
Offshore staff
EXETER, UK – HydroSurv reports that it has received funding that will enable it to continue its use of uncrewed surface vessels (USVs) to map seagrass coverage on the seabed.
The company says that the funding, which will come from Innovate UK, will allow it to continue its partnership with the University of Plymouth, and enable it to further advance its USV mapping techniques and systems.
Building on previous collaborations with the University and Valeport, the project aims to generate a comprehensive picture of seagrass meadows as well as to characterize the environment in which they are growing, enabling ecosystem health to be determined from the same survey campaign.
The project will see HydroSurv’s fully electric USV data acquisition platform developed further to deliver comprehensive, seagrass monitoring using an acoustic ground discrimination system, coupled with video and environmental data collection from new hull-mounted and underwater sensor arrays. These include two specialist cameras and a laser range finder which has been deployed to a constant altitude using an intelligently controlled cast winch on the HydroSurv REAV-28 USV.
