PRE2022 3 Group7

Title of our page

Group members

Names	Study	ID	Email
Max van Wijk	Electrical Engineering	1736418	m.h.o.v.wijk@student.tue.nl
David van Warmerdam	Electrical Engineering	1714171	d.s.v.warmerdam@student.tue.nl
Luka Tepavčević	Electrical Engineering	1720996	l.tepavcevic@student.tue.nl
Bob Verbeek	Biomedical Engineering	1752510	b.m.verbeek@student.tue.nl
Yu-Hsuan Lin	Computer Science	1672363	y.lin1@student.tue.nl
Saskia ten Dam	Psychology and Technology	1577328	s.e.t.dam@student.tue.nl

Initial design concepts and their respective links

• A swarm of drones to either detect or extinguish wildfires
  • Detecting wildfire in the first place
  • https://edition.cnn.com/2022/11/17/tech/drone-amplified/index.html
  • https://www.mdpi.com/2571-6255/5/3/75
  • https://cstwiki.wtb.tue.nl/wiki/PRE2018_1_Group1: Designing a single fire extinguisher drone to fly throughout a smart home environment to prevent and or delay the spreading of fires
  • https://cstwiki.wtb.tue.nl/wiki/PRE2020_3_Group1 : drone to detect wildfires
• Something with drones in general
  • Interconnecting drones, swarm robotics
    • here will be a lot to talk about concerning ethics
    • https://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2013/608164/ intro to swam tech
    • https://hackaday.com/tag/swarm-robotics/ existing related projects
  • quadcopter/plane uavs
  • Merge with the first idea Wildfire detecting
  • https://cstwiki.wtb.tue.nl/wiki/PRE2016_3_Groep16: Detecting people who have been struck by disasters or are stuck in some other way with drones, by means of thermal cameras.
  • https://cstwiki.wtb.tue.nl/wiki/PRE2015_2_Groep1: The use and implementation of swarm robots in rescue situations.
  • https://towardsdatascience.com/swarm-robotics-projects-new-business-models-technical-challenges-d6fa845e56af business POV
• Window cleaning robot (exists)
• Wall painting robot (exists)
• Ocean cleaner robot
  • https://theoceancleanup.com/
  • A deeper focus on microplastics
    • https://www.plymouth.ac.uk/discover/are-microplastics-a-big-problem
    • https://www.alfalaval.com/media/stories/municipal-wastewater-treatment/membranes-a-solution-to-microplastics-in-our-oceans/
    • https://cosmosmagazine.com/earth/oceans/using-sound-capture-microplastics/
• Wildlife trash cleaner
  • Cost would be the immediate concern
• Hand sign robot
  • In most cases a display with the right program can already achieve more than this.
• Intelligent buoy
  • Detecting “unnatural” on top of the water surface (or possibly further down as well by means of a long stick with sensors attached to it). It could detect earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanic activity (above or below sea level). It is possible to make more small scale versions of this buoy to work in a swarm like configuration.
    • https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/adfm.202205313?casa_token=M45KUwR_fzIAAAAA:zO_PmNErkEwLhM39dNmW1weAG_ZVpQyUvuXTzjmyTTsBnMvW60AnZ9XolV_l0dTL7GZ2yqTBxj3SFRs: Intelligent buoy system that is able to detect rises in water levels to detect incoming flooding disasters. The buoy is self-powered by means of water circulation, this is done with triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs).
    • https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211285519303271?casa_token=TkYjq1poG8EAAAAA:rRXHZavrylTsVoW_iYeDf4hA3UIrm3ki_oTFMzNnMK_fNwQ2YkUPlTadpZIS__J9SKxyMrL8Ww: General information about how to generate energy inside of an intelligent buoy by means of the ocean waves. Also states the idea of incorporating a temperature sensor inside of the buoy.
  • The buoy could also be used to detect how clean the water is, or it could sense something about its surroundings and predict stuff about the ecosystem the buoy has been placed in.
    • https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/22/11/4078: A buoy that is able to measure the quality of the water, and send this data back to a server.
• Robobee
  • https://wyss.harvard.edu/technology/robobees-autonomous-flying-microrobots/
• Disaster response robots
  • Problem is mostly due to the rough terrain
  • Existing ones: https://builtin.com/robotics/rescue-robots (gives a list of good examples), https://www.mhi.com/products/energy/robot-mechatronics.html (these are more power plant based)
  • Find people after avalanche
    • https://www.sandia.gov/media/NewsRel/NR2000/avalanch.htm
    • https://www.researchgate.net/publication/317942216_1A2-I10_Development_of_Rescue_Robot_to_Search_for_the_Avalanche_VictimsSearch_and_Rescue_Robot_and_mechatronics
  • Seems to be fairly developed.
• Weather balloons but for detecting wildfires
  • No worry for battery life
  • Basically already exists:
    • https://www.urbansky.com/ (https://www.popsci.com/environment/wildfire-tracking-balloons/ )is a balloon, their main selling point is that it is not at the same level as drones, planes and helicopters but higher which results in them not being an obstacle for said drones etc. while those are in each other's way.
    • https://wildfiretoday.com/2022/08/18/mapping-wildfires-from-70000-feet/?sfw=pass1675802929 . multiple solutions which are used/improved today.
    • https://www.euronews.com/next/2021/08/02/firefighters-in-france-are-using-a-balloon-to-spot-forest-fires-as-soon-as-they-start . It is a balloon with a camera and it is secure to the ground.
  • Balloon serves as base from which fire prevention drones can be sent
    • Drones are used to extinguish the fire
• Deep sea mining assistant
  • Problems surrounding deep sea mining:
    • Plumes are the biggest issue as well as light and sound pollution (https://ec.europa.eu/research-and-innovation/en/horizon-magazine/underwater-debris-clouding-hopes-sustainable-deep-sea-mining)
  • Difficult to really find a user with this

Final design subject

Swarm of Intelligent buoys that are able to sense its souroundings and deliver data based on this

Users

The target group of our device would be people who live close to either oceans or rivers, or areas where it is known that floods are prone to occur. Although The Netherlands is excelently protected against the ocean, it is still below sea level, making it a dangerous area if floods were to occur.

Therefore, everyone listed above will benefit from having something installed that could reliably warn about incoming floods. However, even if you don’t live in one of the mentioned areas, you can still benefit. This is because floods can cause major damage to the economy of a country, making it generally harder for others, or other surrounding countries as well.

To summarise, the most important stakeholders include:

• The general public: benefits from the increased protection
• The government: Increased chance of economy stability
• Investors: Due to implementation, they get higher returns (or something, i'm not an investor). They may also have some say in the development process.
• Inventors/designers: Can sell patents for money, or design further. They also directly control how it operates.

State of the art

Generating energy:

1. Tidal current power generation: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40722-016-0044-8 + https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/030142159190049T - There are different types of tidal current generators: turbines (multiple types), kites and hydrofoils. Out of these 3, turbines are the easiest to understand, however, they either require too much space (axial-flow), or don’t generate enough reliable power (cross-flow). Furthermore, the materials could get damaged by prolonged contact with water, reducing the lifespan of anything operating in the water.
2. Wave energy generation: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1364032115003925?casa_token=CVv0TFwNB7EAAAAA:4Y-xywxZlAy8BZ6r8pWrPb8Awjj4AhK5sI4MiIz0dBDEToEbmcoQwQ-DvR6aurkkL3MSNqI67k4M + https://aip.scitation.org/doi/full/10.1063/1.4974496  - Either linear or radial generation. For us, linear would be the better option as it requires less space (but is, of course, less efficient). This generation would be done by means of moving multiple permanent magnets around, creating a moving magnetic field, inducing a flux through a coil, which in turn produces current. This method will, however, only work when waves are high enough, and may, therefore, not produce enough power for whatever we may want to install inside our aperatus.
3. Solar power generation: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214785318312665 - may be possible, however, it would mean that there is a large possibility that the device would not be active for large periods of time. Further, life spans of PV cells are not extremely long, and are easily damaged, making it not the best solution for ocean power generation.
4. Triboelectric nanogenerators: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211285519304628?casa_token=2Tpy27NOQPAAAAAA:ujdMrGEREH3dbh4gfeWgOvj3Wj5Br3X2cEBS-_Dg5jG00sTSDGgrxvZkc4G2e98LYs_pvBX90yVT + https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211285514002353?casa_token=Ow53wafsXIkAAAAA:D4sDZMP-x4ull8nveIxces-zSmaTDom9e4ERPpAaqBPiYtD4OT14B4j5SPJdqJKm6GjanENsUT2n - The generation of energy created by rubbing two objects against each other. The rubbing part will then occur due to the mechanical energy provided by the ocean waves.

Conclusion: In general, most of the solutions regarding waves or movements take into account the fact that the generation is able to take place on a fixed point. If we would use something that floats in water, this may become an issue. Therefore, although it is not the most optimal, PV energy generation (solar panels), seems to be the best solution.

Weekly approach and general planning

Maybe make 2 tables, one for the general planning and one for what we actually did week-by-week (with times and such).