This paper identifies the interdependency and impact of the maintenance of assets with the use of robotics in combination with artificial intelligence to support the modern ‘Operator 4.0’. The execution of high-quality, well-planned and efficiently-executed maintenance is crucial in today's energy production process, both from a reliability/ functionality and from an economic point of view. Applying such smart maintenance is an important driver to create long-lasting reliable performance during the operational lifetime of an asset, which will also be extended by executing such intelligent maintenance.
Since a few years, a number of Robotics and Big Data technologies have come to the market and these are two of the major market disruptors, accelerating innovation and noteworthy changes to the industry. Well-equipped ground robots will become the new data gatherers, using a suite of high-quality sensors and predictive algorithms to provide real-time advice. Interpreted by experienced maintenance engineers - this leads to intelligent decision-making to sustain or enhance high performance levels on any production site. Important breakthrough of this development is the strong reduction in cost, the ‘simplicity’ and the almost miniatured size of the associated equipment, and the acceleration in e.g. computing power to process the many data streams and convert it in easy to interprete information.
We have assessed, in practice, how such robots can indeed act as the (extra) eyes, ears and brains on the ground, for today's - and tomorrow's - operator and/or maintenance technician. This paper will detail a number of examples of state-of-the-art robotic solutions for operation and maintenance purposes, coupled to Big Data technologies, and the challenges that lie ahead of the industry to create the high-capital industrial installations of the future, starting today. The information gathered during our demonstrations and described in this paper will lead to new, inspiring and smart ways of designing, operating and maintaining energy production infrastructures - brownfield and greenfield, onshore & offshore - by using ground robots and the latest sensor and predictive maintenance technologies, adapted to the workforce of the 21st century.