Autonomous Surface Vehicle Workshop

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ACT Autonomous Surface Vehicle Workshop Report Page 6 of 34
Introduction
To explore recent advancements of ASV technology, NOAA, through the IOOS Program Office
), funded ACT to organize a workshop on Autonomous Surface
Vehicles (ASVs) for Shallow Water Mapping and Water Quality Monitoring. The workshop
focused on accelerating research, operational readiness and further development of ASV
technologies. The workshop was planned and executed with the involvement and cooperation
of a broad and diverse group of federal agencies, vendors and manufacturers, resource
managers and university researchers with scientific and operational application experience.
ACT convened the workshop at the University of Maryland’s Center for Environmental Sciences
(UMCES), Chesapeake Biological Laboratory (CBL) to develop a consensus of future actions that
would accelerate the feasibility of having unmanned systems, particularly ASVs, to meet
shallow water survey requirements established by NOAA and to aid in the transition of evolving
technologies from ”research tools” to “operational tools.” In particular, the workshop focused
on opportunities in the user market, performance parameters, usability requirements, cost
considerations, and feasibility of use.
NOAA’s National Ocean Service (NOS) line office provides services and tools that play a key role
in ensuring the safe and efficient movement of ships while protecting our nation’s waterways
and coastal environments. High quality surveying, mapping and water quality monitoring of
coastal waters are essential to NOS’s work. The combination of these compelling and
collaborative goals provided the framework within which to assess the current state of ASV
development and to create an avenue to further advance this developing technology. This
national level workshop was conceived to inform and advance the current “state of the art” of
autonomous surface vehicles.
The purpose of the workshop was to explore current and soon to be in place technologies to: a)
better understand their potential benefits and limitations; b) to understand end-user
requirements for ASV applications; and, c) to make strategic recommendations for the future
development and application of ASVs for environmental water quality monitoring and
surveying in shallow coastal waters. While the initial scope of the workshop and
manufacturers’ demonstrations were focused on shallow water, the lessons learned inform
decisions regarding broader application of ASVs by addressing challenging environments.
The workshop addressed questions, including:
• Could ASVs provide improved efficiency of data acquisition, including a reduction in
time, personnel, and operating costs?
• Could ASVs provide improved quality of data acquired?
• Could ASVs provide improved safety of survey operations?
• Could ASVs provide data that is beneficial, but otherwise unattainable or typically
difficult to obtain?
Much of the current ASV technology operates at a level of basic autonomy. Autonomy can be
described as independence, or freedom from external control or influence. ASVs represent a
field of emerging, integrated, marine observing technologies that includes hardware, software,