Smart Waterways

The multidisciplinary SmartWaterWays consortium is made up of regulators and experts in communication, sensors, machine learning, localization, logistics and socio-economic impacts, among many other domains. They will achieve several innovation goals, including:

1. Develop a low-cost communication, sensing and localization solution without compromising on industrial standards.
2. Build a new model of the world by mapping data from diverse sources to 2D navigational maps and create a control model for autonomous navigation.
3. Enable reliable low-latency wireless communication that uses different types of wireless networks depending on location.
4. Analyze the socio-economic feasibility of urban logistics that relies on unmanned cargo vessels.

Demonstrated in an urban, waterway-dense location

The outcome of the project will be an automated PBM and sensor-equipped onshore infrastructure located along a waterway route in the urban zone of Ghent, Belgium. Industry partners will benefit from the leap of knowledge by opening up new market segments, lowering costs through automation and new low-cost localization solutions.