The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) is developing an autonomous all-electric passenger ferries for urban water transport. This project aims to develop new concepts and methods to advance the development of autonomous passenger ferries for transport of people in urban water channels.
Currently, there are a few number of unmanned cable ferries at several locations in Norway. This project aims to enable such ferries to operate autonomously.
The ferry will have the following characteristics:
- On-demand ferry – push the button for the ferry to come;
- Electrical propulsion, Automatic charging of batteries;
- Navigation: High-precision GNSS plus backup system;
- Anti-collision system.
The main hypothesis of the project is that autonomous ferries can operate safely alongside other vessels in congested environments such as urban water channels. To verify this, a broad multi-disciplinary approach, is needed.
[smlsubform prepend=”GET THE SAFETY4SEA IN YOUR INBOX!” showname=false emailtxt=”” emailholder=”Enter your email address” showsubmit=true submittxt=”Submit” jsthanks=false thankyou=”Thank you for subscribing to our mailing list”]
The project involves 19 researchers from three faculties and all three NTNU campuses. These specialize in the fields of control systems, autonomous systems, sensor fusion, robotic vision, instrumentation systems, communication systems, artificial intelligence, cyber security, risk management, power systems and human factors, constituting a unique multi-disciplinary project team, which is required to solve the challenges of this project.
