Shanxi's power grid is one of the most complex in the country, with 70% of its lines in mountainous areas and nearly 65% in high and rugged mountains. Manual inspection of these lines is extremely inefficient.

In 2023, Shanxi Power Grid has realized full coverage of autonomous UAV inspection in the main network. However, due to problems such as endurance time and flight distance, inspection personnel are still required to arrive at the site before they can carry out work. For distribution lines in cross-mountain areas, operation and maintenance personnel find the task extremely challenging. For this reason, Shanxi Power Grid actively carries out the deepening application of various types of UAV inspection. Considering various comprehensive factors, Shanxi Power Grid vigorously promotes the installation and use of UAV intelligent cabin.

China News did a special report on this issue.

This article is from China News

In order to comprehensively improve the fine management level of Shanxi power grid and enhance the quality and efficiency of transmission line operation and maintenance. Shanxi Power Grid adopts unattended innovation measures, chooses to build Honeycomb Aerospace SU-30 intelligent unmanned airport, expands the application scenarios of digitalization in power grid management, the UAV automatically executes flight tasks, realizes the full coverage of inspection scope, effectively identifies all kinds of anomalies, and extends the antenna of power grid management inspection into each grid, aiming at problems and sending force accurately. It has opened a new mode of unattended power grid inspection.

Compared with the traditional manual operation mode, Honeycomb Aerospace SU-30 intelligent unmanned airport truly realizes "unmanned operation". It relies on autonomous flight of UAV to complete the fine inspection work of the power poles and towers, realize field deployment and unattended operation, and significantly improve the inspection efficiency. At the same time, the autonomous inspection mode is not affected by the geographical environment, so as to better guarantee the personal safety of operation and maintenance personnel.

When the operator gives instructions from the control platform, the UAV takes off from the unattended airport, quickly arrives at the scheduled tower, accurately identifies and locates various anomalies according to the planned inspection path, completes the inspection of the first tower and automatically flies to the next tower without any manual operation. After the UAV completes all inspection tasks, it will automatically return to the UAV cabin and automatically charge to wait for the next inspection task.

The overhead lines of the power grid are generally located in remote areas with a long distance from the command center. The SU-30 intelligent unmanned airport uses 4G/5G network for data transmission, with an unrestricted transmission distance and no blockage by obstacles. Operators do not need to go to the site and can remotely control the UAV on the visual interface and grasp the status of inspection in real time. Realizing the remote visual management of transmission lines can improve the safety management level of the power grid.

The traditional "human patrol + UAV patrol" mode is mainly carried out by operation and maintenance personnel on-site. It features a heavy workload and tedious tasks for production-site personnel, and the fineness of inspection depends entirely on the skill level and sense of responsibility of the personnel. However, due to the complexity of inspection work, it is impossible to cover all aspects, resulting in many inspection blind spots. Moreover, the timeliness of feedback from on-site personnel and the degree of problem-solving closure are low. As a result, many problems still persist in much of the work. Therefore, the remote, digital and intelligent management mode based on the SU-30 intelligent unmanned airport can address various problems existing in the field operation.

Power grid security is related to economic and social development and public security, and is the "lifeline" of the development of State Grid Corporation. Honeycomb Aerospace intelligent unmanned airport helps Shanxi Power Grid to develop autonomous UAV inspection application, improves the safe operation level of power distribution lines, realizes the standardization and normalization of power grid inspection, and effectively improves the quality and efficiency of power grid operation and maintenance.