Smart Utility Registration

September 23, 2024Léon olde Scholtenhuis

Organisation || Siers Infraconsult
Project Type || EngD study
Candidate || Nima Zarrinpanjeh

Project Duration || 1-1-2021 — 21-12-2023

Smart Utility Registration aimed to support the philosophy of feeding construction site data more swiftly in utility geo-databases. Contributing to the goal of getting rich data more effectively “from Trench to GIS”, the goal of this project was to develop a fast and accurate 3D registration process for underground utility networks. We scrutinized the available technologies, such as available SfM and lasers in smartphones, combined with low-cost GNSS RTK. This culminated into a working prototype for 3D utility scanning.

Scanning Technology based on iOS LiDAR and Leica FLX GNSS, example application.

The initial and essential step in the development of such a prototype was the use of a suitable measurement unit to collect data. This project compared various alternative technologies and eventually used a commercial GNSS receiver and the iOS Lidar device. This combination can acquire 3D models of the trenches and their accurate location. Processing of the data will lead to 3D products.

Overview of Data Flow during utility measurements: from Trench to GIS

In the second step, the point clouds can be processed into Digital Surface Models, 2D orthoimages and 3D textured meshes. Manual and semi-automatic extraction of the utilities from those models seem suitable as well (and are explored beyond the scope of this project). The resulting 3D visualizations of the utilities could eventually be loaded in 3D viewers and XR applications.

The project succesfully ended with a working prototype for generation of 3D models, untapping new data driven approaches for subsurface infrastructure construction and management.