PROJECT PERIODIC REPORT Publishable Summary

Transcription

1 Project No.: Project Acronym: ACEM-Rail Project Full Name: Automated and Cost Effective Maintenance for Railway PROJECT PERIODIC REPORT Publishable Summary Period covered: from 01/06/2012 to 30/11/2013 Period number: 2 nd Start date of project: 01/12/2010 Project coordinator name: Dr. NOEMI JIMÉNEZ-REDONDO Project coordinator organisation name: Centro de Estudios de Materiales y Control de Obra S.A. (CEMOSA) Version: 1 Copyright 2014, the members of the ACEM-Rail Page 1 of 6

2 Table of Contents 1 PUBLISHABLE SUMMARY Overview and project objectives Description of the work performed Expected final results and potential impacts Consortium and Contact details... 6 Copyright 2014, the members of the ACEM-Rail Page 2 of 6

3 1 Publishable summary 1.1 Overview and project objectives ACEM-Rail is a collaborative Seventh Framework Programme project under SST 'Automated and cost effective railway infrastructure maintenance', funded by the European Commission comprising 10 partners from five European countries. ACEM-Rail project deals with automation and optimization of railway infrastructure maintenance. Automated and cost effective railway maintenance is a key factor to increase the capacity and availability of railway infrastructure and, consequently, the competitiveness of rail services. This is particularly remarkable for rail freight transport that would benefit from higher track availability because of the frequently update of track state thanks to the technologies developed in the project. This allows running during the night and, as a consequence, increase the competitiveness of freight transport which, at the moment, is far behind of goods transport by road. One of the advantages of the latter is that they can run 24 hours per day. One of the EU goals is to reduce road freight transport in order to reduce congestion on the main routes, to reduce Green House Gas emissions (road transport is the largest source of GHG emission in the transport sector) and to reduce the number of accidents. Rail transport is a safe, reliable and environment friendly mean of transport. ACEM-Rail project aims for the development of innovative solutions as well as the adoption of solutions from other industries in order to reduce costs, resources, time and impact on rail services of the maintenance activities. In that sense, railway operators, railway infrastructure maintenance companies and users of rail services for both passengers and freight transport are benefited from the innovative solutions that ACEM-Rail has targeted. Improvement of the competitiveness, quality and sustainability of the rail services are the final goals pursued by ACEM-Rail project. ACEM-Rail project deals with automation and optimization of track maintenance. The final goal is to reduce costs, time and resources required for maintenance activities and increase the availability of the infrastructure. The project includes both conventional and high speed lines. ACEM-Rail project has meant an important step forward in railway infrastructure maintenance techniques for the following reasons: 1. Six technologies for automated and cost effective inspection of the track (subgrade and superstructure) condition have been developed and prototypes have been manufactured. One of these technologies (fiber optic) has been laid along the track. Three of them (eddy current system, acoustic based hollow-shaft system and track geometry system based on linear cameras) can be embarked on both high speed and conventional speed trains, while the remaining two (ultrasonic and thermography systems) can only be embarked on special testing trains. 2. Algorithms have been developed to evaluate track condition and to estimate track degradation. Analysis of the influence of the vehicle (load, speed and traffic) on track state has been an important subject of this research. Copyright 2014, the members of the ACEM-Rail Page 3 of 6

4 3. Algorithms have been developed for an optimal planning of railway infrastructure maintenance tasks integrating the scheduling of predictive, preventive and corrective operations taking into account the available resources and rail services. 4. Models and tools have been developed in order to monitor the proper execution of maintenance tasks. These technologies are developed to be applied in mobile (hand-held) computers. This way, the execution and monitoring of maintenance tasks have been automated and optimized while operators in field are assisted. 5. A methodology and tool has been developed to centralize and manage all the information on railway infrastructure and service to automate the maintenance process and to provide Decision Support Tools to assist railway infrastructure managers. This tool, which is based on the commercial software MAXIMO (IBM) on top of which some tailored programming have been performed. It is at the core of the ACEM-Rail project. It manages and centralised all the information required for items 1-4 above. 1.2 Description of the work performed During the second period (M19-M36) of the project, the main activities have focused on: - Instrumentation final developments and set up of sensors. - Validation of sensors system and analysis of results from laboratory and field tests. - Development of methods and tools for the track condition evaluation and evaluation prediction. - Development of specific methodologies for optimization and planning of maintenance tasks. - Implantation of new processes and tools for assisting and monitoring preventive, predictive and corrective maintenance. - Development and validation of the subsystems management processes and systems. - Field demonstration at Wegberg-Wildenrath (Germany) and Ferrovie de Gargano (Italy). - Definition and evaluation of Maintenance Performance Indicators to assess the impact of ACEM-Rail s developments in railway systems. - Definition and evaluation of qualitative and quantitative factors to assess project performance. - Analysis of lessons learned. - Dissemination and exploitation activities. All of the scientific/technical objectives (STO) have been fulfilled. The STO are listed below: STO1. Development of innovative solutions for automated and intelligent analysis of infrastructure condition including: automatic inspection and evaluation of infrastructure condition. STO2. Development of automated analysis and planning of maintenance operations. STO3. Development of innovative solutions for the optimal execution and maintenance of operations. Copyright 2014, the members of the ACEM-Rail Page 4 of 6

5 STO4. Development of innovative management systems for the control of infrastructure components to facilitate the automated maintenance. STO5. Analysis and possible adoption of maintenance solutions in other industries. STO6. Development of simulations and implementation of solutions for the demonstration of automated and cost-effective maintenance solutions. All of the technical achievements (TA) are also already achieved and finished. TA1. Innovative processes, systems and tools for the automated and cost effective inspection, monitoring of infrastructure condition. TA2. Integration of automated maintenance systems with traffic and rail services systems in order to facilitate the automation of maintenance operations. TA3. Innovative processes and systems for the automated and intelligent analysis, decision making and planning of maintenance operations. TA4. Implementation and utilization of new processes and tools for the optimal and cost effective execution of preventive maintenance operations. TA5. Implementation and utilization of new processes and tools for the optimal and cost effective execution of corrective maintenance operations. TA6. Innovative systems and processes for the management of infrastructure components. TA7. Adoption and adaptation of maintenance solutions utilized in other industries. TA8. Simulation and implementation of the developed solutions in order to demonstrate and evaluate the results. 1.3 Expected final results and potential impacts One of the main features of the ACEM-Rail approach is that it tackles the problem of track maintenance in a comprehensive way covering the different stages and agents involved. Therefore, as a whole, the ACEM-Rail project will mean an important step forward in the state of the art of railway maintenance. ACEM-Rail has achieved important results in the following fields: 1. Progress beyond the state of the art has been achieved in relation to automated and unattended track monitoring embarked on commercial trains (conventional/high speed and passengers/freight) and laid along the track (based on fibre optic). This allows very frequent measures of track state and therefore very accurate knowledge on track condition and degradation estimation. 2. Progress beyond the state of the art has been achieved in relation to asset management systems for linear infrastructures and, in particular, for railway. ACEM-Rail has developed an Infrastructure Subsystem Management (ISM) which manages and centralizes all the information on the railway system in the same platform and allows for the communication and interaction of the different modules of the ACEM-Rail approach. The ISM is the tool that allows automating the maintenance process. It also provides the shell to allocate Decision Support Tools to help Railway Infrastructure Managers. This tool was developed Copyright 2014, the members of the ACEM-Rail Page 5 of 6

6 on top of a commercial tool (IBM MAXIMO). Its development was modular to facilitate its gradual application in a real railway system. 3. A Performance Measurement System is proposed to evaluate the economic, social and environmental impact of the maintenance process and, in particular, of the ACEM-Rail system. The closer knowledge on track state achieved thanks to the developments in item 1 above together with the unique platform to integrate all the information and allocate Decision Support Tools (such as those in relation to warning management, estimation of defects degradation or optimization and scheduling of maintenance tasks) developed in item 2 above will allow for the evolution of the traditional maintenance based on predictive/corrective tasks to a more cost-effective and automated system based on conditions/prediction. This is a remarkable step forward of ACEM-Rail. Besides, a system to evaluate the economic, social and environmental sustainability of the maintenance process is proposed in item 3. ACEM-Rail has proven to produce the following benefits and impacts: an important reduction in the cost of railway maintenance; an improvement in the safety of rail services and a reduction in maintenance crew working accidents; an improvement of the quality of rail services due the better comfort conditions and the fewer disruptions of rail services and also an improvement on the reliability of the system; an reduction in the number of trips of the maintenance crew and as a consequence a reduction in CO2 emissions in these trips; finally, the capacity of the track will be enlarged because of the better management of time slots for maintenance tasks. This allows for an increase in rail freight services. Hence, less CO2 emissions and other pollutants will be expelled because of the market share transferred from freight road transport to freight rail transport (being rail transport greener than road one. Thus, the ACEM-Rail Project has achieved important benefits, both socio-economic and environmental. In summary, the Project has increased the cost-effectiveness and the automation degree of railway infrastructure maintenance. All of this helps to improve the competitiveness of European rail transport significantly reducing inspection and maintenance costs and increasing the safety, quality and reliability of rail services. Moreover, all of this also contributes to the reduction of pollutants expelled to the atmosphere for a greener and more sustainable European transport system. 1.4 Consortium and Contact details The composition of the consortium guarantees an optimal processing of the project targets. The consortium is made up of the following organizations: CEMOSA (Project Coordinator, Spain), University of Seville (Scientific Manager, Spain), Fraunhofer (Germany), Politecnico di Torino (Italy), Seconda Universita degli Studi di Napoli (Italy), Optim-al Ltd (Bulgaria), DMA (Italy), Tecnomatica (Italy), SIEMENS (Germany) and ScanMaster Ltd. (Israel). The contacts details can be addressed to and Copyright 2014, the members of the ACEM-Rail Page 6 of 6