On May 14, 2019, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) announced that it had completed a demonstration of its remote data collection capabilities for maintenance and inspection, using a remotely controlled underwater vehicle and a drone at the Choshi offshore wind power farm. The demonstration was conducted from November 2018 to January 2019 to examine the feasibility of automating remote maintenance and inspection activities for offshore wind farms. In the future, the use of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV) and drones is expected to improve the efficiency of maintenance and inspection activities in harsh environments.

The demonstration project confirmed that the underwater vehicle was able to be controlled remotely and take images under difficult conditions, such as in murky and/or turbulent water, at water depths of 20m or less. The drone test demonstrated that it can take images of turbine blades to inspect any damage or dirt while the wind turbines were turned off. Based on the results of the project, TEPCO will further examine how to improve the efficiency of autonomous underwater vehicles under severe conditions, and how to enable the use of drones while the wind turbine blades are running.