The platform is called ALICS (Adaptive Lighting for the Inspection of Concrete Structures), and promises to significantly enhance inspection speed, accuracy, and safety, ultimately leading to substantial cost savings for civil asset owners.

It does so by using AI-powered image capture, scene lighting, and colour methods to detect faults in civil concrete infrastructure – including nuclear power plants and bridges – on a more regular basis than manual inspections. 

Fiona MacDonald, impact manager at Built Environment – Smarter Transformation, commented on the new tool, saying it can “enhance not only safety within the industry, but the efficiency and commercial performance of invested partners all while creating a technology with the potential to truly transform operational performance within our built environment.”

Outages and closures in civil infrastructure can cost millions of pounds in lost productivity, and ripple effects with broader economic impacts. For example, taking one nuclear plant offline could cost upwards of £1 million per day depending on energy market prices according to Power Engineering International. 

“Inspection is rightly an important part of maintaining assets, and with innovative technologies like this, it can be done continuously and more efficiently,” said Rachael Wakefield, business development manager at CENSIS.

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The development of the ALICS device would not have been possible without the industry partnerships struck with Cavendish Nuclear (Babcock), Altrad Babcock, Bruce Power, EDF Energy and InspectaHire, which provided financial support and expertise to the project. ALICS also collaborated with two of Scotland’s innovation centres: Built Environment – Smarter Transformation and CENSIS

Marcus Perry, senior lecturer in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Strathclyde, said: “Partnerships between industry, Scottish innovation centres, and universities are different. They allow research to be designed, funded, and delivered with continuous dialogue between all three parties.

“This sustained feedback means industry partners can steer our research direction more effectively. This ensures the academic delivery team deliver not only world-leading science, but high-impact engineering outputs and products with real world applications.”