Mobile robot for power substation inspection: a survey

Abstract

This paper presents the most important achievements in the field of electric power substation equipment's inspection by mobile robot. To accelerate the realization of unattended substation, which would improve the reliability, safety and intelligence of power substation, the field of automated power substation equipment's inspection has been greatly developed over the last decade. The paper addresses the power substation inspection robot, which is considered as one of the most active fields of research on mobile robot, from its history to design requirements, the robot system architecture analysis and modeling, reliability technology of the robot, autonomy and universality of substation equipment inspection. Besides, summaries and suggestions on the development and research trend of inspection robot, which should be addressed in the future, are given. The present work may serve as reference for initial design of robots for some complex and dangerous working environments. And some unique insights for the inspection robot provided in this paper may be of help to further research and application of power facilities inspection.