The Research of Intelligent Sensing Technology Applied to Site Management

The Industrial 4.0 era is coming and the Information and Communication Technology are developing rapidly. CTCI Group introduced automated and intelligent sensing technology in the EPC turnkey practice, and in 2016, the innovation and R&D center cooperated with the National Chiao Tung University to develop appropriate smart sensing technology and import it into the construction site for safety and materials management, in order to reduce the incidence of occupational disasters, and improve staff management and plant engineering efficiency.

Establish industrial-academic cooperation
Build leading industry engineering technology

After the concept of Industry 4.0 was coined at the Hanover Fair in 2011, it was widely adapted in Europe, America, Mainland China, and other areas, gradually became a major trend that drew the attention of governments and industries. The Internet of Things (IoT) is an important key to the realization of Industry 4.0. It is to interconnect and share information between independent "items" via the Internet, collect useful information, and combine artificial intelligence to achieve automation and intelligence.

CTCI and Chiao Tung University signed a letter of intent for industrial-academic cooperation in July of 2016. Based on Industry 4.0 automation and Intelligence as Core Strategies. We use the Internet of Things, cloud computing, big data analysis, robots, artificial intelligence and other innovative technologies to create industry-leading engineering solutions. The project team is composed of five professors from Chiao Tung University and Tamkang University and related Doctor/Master students. It mainly implements three practical research topics which is shown in Figure 1 for overall structure：
1.Applications of smart safety helmet are for falls with fall precursor detection and gas concentration detection with estimation of confined space.

2.Communications of confined space contains BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy) and Wi-Fi network establishment.
3.Application of IoT technology for material tracking management studies.

Figure 1 Overall Structure

IoT intelligent sensing for realizing intelligent site management

In the Topic 1 of this research project, the confined space refers to the space in which human action and survivability are affected. In this confined space, hazardous gases often exist, but workers often do not know it. Once an accident occurs, all on-site engineering operations must stop, causing major losses to life and the company. Therefore, this study of the topic 1 will be oriented towards the confined space and provide the technical integration of industrial safety and IoT information. For example, adding intelligent sensing in the design of site safety helmets, such as the temperature, humidity, air quality, and harmful gas in the working environment, or assessing the remaining working time of the workers. This objective of the topic is to successfully achieve immediate detection of personnel status and environmental gases then improve the safety of personnel working in confined spaces and reduce the risk burden on the site.
In Topic 2, the purpose of the study is to establish a wireless network for the confined space to provide the network transmission infrastructure for Topic 1. Utilizing the framework of wireless network built in the confined space to the monitoring end can help we collect more effective information for construction personnel and achieve the purpose of safeguarding construction workers. The objective of this topic is to realize the network architecture applicable to confined space of various types and the self-generating framework network with transmission methods can be easily installed by construction personnel to quickly construct a framework network with security guard function.

In topic 3, the purpose of the research is to effectively manage the construction materials thus study the location of the wooden boxes that control the storage materials in the storage space. Using IoT components such as Beacon, RFID and wireless transmission, combined with mobile devices for research, we create a management with practical value for achieving the needs mentioned above.

CTCI develops IoT intelligent sensing for site management. The data are collected by IoT for intelligent analysis in  construction site and immediately detects  dangerous actions of construction personnel with harmful gases in the environment so that personnel safety can be furtherenhanced.

For warehouse management, we utilize the GPS positioning system to detect the position of the material and combined with the mobile device to seek the wooden box, effectively improving the working efficiency of the warehousing personnel.

Establish CTCI smart engineering competitiveness from IoT to AIoT

Through the industrial-academic cooperation platform, not only can CTCI Group's corporate social responsibility for “cultivating engineering talents” be implemented, but our past data can be applied to the engineering field by big data analytics to make design and construction more efficient. The use of artificial intelligence and IoT sensing technology can also upgrade CTCI Group’s expertise in turnkey engineering to smarter engineering.

Technological development continues to break through with continuous expansion of AI applications. In the future, the Internet of Things will become more intelligent. Unlike the Internet which can only be passively used by people. AI and IoT will be integrated into the Intelligent Internet of Things (AIoT) to realize the vision of intelligentized EPC, strengthening the competitiveness of CTCI Group in the international engineering market.