New Oil-in-Water Sensor

Applied Microsystems announces the availability of Leak-Sentry, our new oil-in-water sensor. Leak-Sentry is deployed underwater and uses fluorometry to detect emulsified or dissolved hydrocarbons. Unlike other fluorometers, Leak-Sentry is equipped with the necessary intelligence to rapidly characterise background hydrocarbon levels and alarm upon detection of incremental leaks or spills. Detection signals are communicated to a process control system, to a data-logger, or to any PC running Applied Microsystems' Spill-View software. Leak-Sentry is ideal for integration onto oceanographic buoys for long-term environmental monitoring. Similarly, the instrument can be deployed at critical points on submerged pipelines for early-warning of possible leaks. In... (read more)

2004-07-02 12:00:00

OGC Announces Water Data Summit

The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) has announced a Water Data Summit to be held at the UCAR/NCAR Center Green in Boulder, Colorado. USA, on 3 June 2015. This event is part of the June 2015 OGC Technical Committee Meeting. The goal of the Water Data Summit is to stimulate engagement in development of tools and policies for the U.S. Open Water Data Initiative (OWDI). The Open Water Data Initiative will integrate different sources of water information into a connected, national water data framework and leverage existing systems, infrastructure and tools to underpin innovation, modelling, data sharing and solution development. Similar... (read more)

2015-05-18 09:26:36

New ‘FerryBox’ Water Quality Monitor

Xylem Analytics UK and Aanderaa Data Instruments have launched a new marine water quality monitor designed to enable wider deployment of water quality sensors on ferries and other marine vessels. The ‘SOOGuard’ will be launched at Ocean Business in April 2013. The system’s four sensors (conductivity, temperature, optical dissolved oxygen and chlorophyll A) are fitted onto the door of a flow-through cell - a design that allows simple and rapid cleaning. The sensors are very stable and require calibration checks less than once a year in most environments. Further flow-though cells can be fitted to allow for the measurement of... (read more)

2013-03-05 04:21:46

Cable Tracking in Shallow Water

Tailoring Systems for Inshore Operations

Whilst there has been an increased effort to resolve the issues of supporting deepwater construction operations, issues specific to shallow-water operations seem to have been largely overlooked, the attitude being that standard equipment packages would be perfectly adequate. What makes this all the more surprising is that the majority of offshore developments have some sort of shallow-water requirement associated with beach landing points. As always, the other factor driving all developments is cost. Whilst the high price of oil has produced a boom in oil-construction support, the laws of supply and demand have increased vessel and service provision rates to... (read more)

2007-05-31 12:00:00

Object Identification in Turbid Water

Near video-quality Images from Acoustic Systems

Working underwater requires visual feedback to prevent work slowing or even coming to a halt. Acoustic systems make images in turbid water, but not always with the required detail provided by optical systems. This article reviews technology that provides near-optical-quality acoustic images, allowing work to continue in zero-visibility water. Problem Overview A significant amount of underwater work takes place in seas, rivers and coastal areas where visibility is minimal and optical systems generate blank screens. Conventional sonar provides images under these conditions, but the detail generally does not come close to the optical detail needed for identification, inspection and manipulation... (read more)

2008-01-01 01:00:00

Mapping Cold Water Coral Reef

In recent trials off Trondheim, Norway, the GeoSwath Plus swath bathymetry and side scan system was used for the first time on a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) to map cold water coral reefs. The objective of the survey was to test how effective the GeoSwath was as a ROV mounted sonar for identifying cold-water coral colonies. At 60m deep the Tautra ridge in Trondheim Fjord is home to world’s shallowest known cold-water coral reef, and was an ideal site for initial system trials. The corals seen there usually thrive in much deeper waters. The GeoSwath was deployed on a Minerva... (read more)

2007-02-12 09:24:28

Satellite-based Water Quality Monitoring

EOMAP, Germany, has launched a high-resolution monitoring service for inland and coastal waters, with water quality information directly accessible online through the eoApp web application. Monitoring water quality for inland and coastal waters is a requirement for many government and private sector entities, which includes identifying long-term trends and understanding emerging problems over large areas that contain numerous water bodies – all to be done in near real time. The service is supported by data from a fleet of satellite sensors and uses proprietary physics-based processing technologies. The base product suite includes water quality parameters such as turbidity, chlorophyll concentrations... (read more)

2015-06-04 09:30:00

Precise RTK GPS Water Levels

Incline plane models in geoid-ellipsoid separation calibration

As more people adopt RTK GPS technology for measuring water levels, the issue of ellipsoid-geoid separation is increasingly being discussed. This article outlines various projects undertaken to calibrate this separation, and presents information to consider when using RTK GPS for measuring relative to an orthometric (geoid) datum. RTK GPS is increasingly being used for measuring water-level corrections during hydrographic survey, as for water levels in general. Measuring this third vertical dimension usually requires local site calibration to correct for separation between WGS84 ellipsoidal height and geoidal elevation, enabling conversion of WGS84 heights to orthometric heights such as mean seal level... (read more)

2008-01-01 01:00:00

Live On-water Ixsea Demonstration

Industry professionals could familiarise themselves with the latest technology available in the Ixsea underwater acoustic and navigation equipment range during Ocean Business 2011 in Southampton, UK. Directly after departure, the Ixsea Echoes 5000 was launched, a range of wide-band chirp sub-bottom profilers capable of generating from very low frequencies and deep penetrations up to very high resolution frequencies. The system is based on more than ten years of sub-bottom experience. The Echoes sub-bottom profiler was mounted on the towed body, but could also be mounted on a pole if required. During the survey Ixsea representatives also demonstrated the... (read more)

2011-04-07 10:15:50

Hottest Water on Earth Discovered

At over 3 kilometres beneath the surface, sitting atop what could be a huge bubble of magma, it's the hottest water ever found on Earth. The fluid is in a "supercritical" state that has never before been seen in nature. The fluid spews out of two black smokers called Two Boats and Sisters Peak. Koschinsky, from Jacobs University in Bremen, Germany, says it is somewhere between a gas and a liquid. She thinks it could offer a first glimpse at how essential minerals and nutrients like gold, copper and iron are leached out of the entrails of the Earth and... (read more)

2008-08-05 10:58:58