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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Robot. AI
Sec. Field Robotics
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/frobt.2024.1426206
This article is part of the Research Topic Robotic Applications for a Sustainable Future View all 4 articles

Concepts for Drone Based Pipeline Leak Detection

Provisionally accepted
Lutz Bretschneider Lutz Bretschneider 1*Sven B. Bollmann Sven B. Bollmann 1Deborah Houssin-Agbomson Deborah Houssin-Agbomson 2Jacob Shaw Jacob Shaw 3Neil Howes Neil Howes 3Linh Nguyen Linh Nguyen 3Rod Robinson Rod Robinson 3Jon Helmore Jon Helmore 3Michael Lichtenstern Michael Lichtenstern 4Javis Nwaboh Javis Nwaboh 5Andrea Pogány Andrea Pogány 5Volker Ebert Volker Ebert 5Astrid Lampert Astrid Lampert 1
  • 1 Technische Universität Braunschweig, Institute of Flight Guidance, Braunschweig, Germany
  • 2 Air Liquide (France), Paris, France
  • 3 National Physical Laboratory, Teddington, United Kingdom
  • 4 Institute of Atmospheric Physics, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Cologne, Germany
  • 5 Physical-Technical Federal Institute, Braunschweig/Brunswick, Niedersachsen, Germany

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    The quickly developing drone technology can be used efficiently in the field of pipeline leak detection. The aim of this article is to provide drone mission concepts for detecting releases from pipelines. It provides an overview of the current applications of natural gas pipeline surveys, it considers environmental conditions by plume modelling, it discusses suitable commercially available sensors, and develops concepts for routine monitoring of pipelines and short term missions for localising and identifying a known leakage. Suitable platforms depend on the particular mission and requirements concerning sensors and legislation. As an illustration, a feasibility study during a release experiment is introduced. The main challenge of this study was the variability of wind direction on a time scale of minutes, which produces considerable differences to the plume simulations. Nevertheless, the leakage rates derived from the observations are in the same order of magnitude as the emission rates. Finally the results from the modeling, the release experiment and possible drone scenarios are combined and requirements for future application derived.

    Keywords: Drone, Leak detection, Methane, pipeline, SDG13, plume modeling, release experiment

    Received: 30 Apr 2024; Accepted: 19 Jul 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Bretschneider, Bollmann, Houssin-Agbomson, Shaw, Howes, Nguyen, Robinson, Helmore, Lichtenstern, Nwaboh, Pogány, Ebert and Lampert. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Lutz Bretschneider, Technische Universität Braunschweig, Institute of Flight Guidance, Braunschweig, Germany

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.