Alexander Ceron is Systems Engineer of the National University of Colombia, Master in Electronic Engineering and Computers of the Andes University. Nowadays he is Assistant Professor of the Multimedia Engineering Program and member of the Multimedia Research Group in the Nueva Granada Military University in Bogota Colombia.
In this chapter we present the development of automated visual inspection systems for electrical infrastructure. The inspection is performed using images acquired with an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). Through automated inspection routes, the state of the infrastructure can be evaluated and then the appropriate correcting measures be taken. The monitoring of power lines can be done using passive sensors such as cameras or active sensors such as light detection and ranging (LIDAR) cameras, image processing techniques, computer vision and control systems can then be used. Additionally, a three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction process is possible using images either offline or during the monitoring. An UAV with an onboard embedded computer is used to execute the computer vision and path planning algorithms. The work done shows that the proposed strategy aids in the automation of power line inspection.
Part of the book: Path Planning for Autonomous Vehicle