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IoT technology improves construction site productivity as labor force decreases
Productivity hasn’t changed in the construction industry for a long time, especially when it comes to earth work. With almost a third of skilled construction workers set to retire in the next ten years, improving productivity will be required to address the future labor shortage.
The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transportation recently learned of the situation and has introduced measures to solve this problem, including “full use of information and communications technology (ICT)” at construction sites.
Nikon · Trimble Corp. is promoting i-Construction, an effort to improve overall productivity and aim for a more attractive construction industry for future laborers.
This consists of utilizing surveying know-how to provide IoT sensors and displays for equipment and machinery that are operating at construction sites. In addition, Nikon · Trimble provides a construction support cloud service called “Trimble Connected Community”, also known as VISIONLINK, which transmits the data from the angle sensors and GPS devices that are are attached to the edge of machinery like excavators, to the cloud.
This enables laborers to view the location of the excavator in real time and facilitates the confirmation and tracking of on-site construction progress remotely. By introducing these capabilities, the management company of the IoT construction machinery can easily understand the operation time of the construction machine and the arrangement information, such as the consistency and efficiency of asset management, as well as the accuracy of the operational speed.
Laborers at the construction site have simplified processes such as tying and piling, indispensable components of construction, through the use of machine control. Once the equipment has finished excavating an area, laborers can can send the results by IoT to the cloud, including the location of the excavation and its depth.
With these new capabilities, construction site supervisors have more tools at their disposal. They can receive safety alerts, register 3D design data online from their personal computer, search for aerial photographs, see cross-sectional data of the excavation, and so much more.
They can even use the “remote assistant” function to monitor construction progress and respond to unexpected system problems on-site.