Creating innovative projects based on artificial intelligence, and that help in solving sustainability challenges, is the goal of Microsoft’s AI for Earth. With an investment of 50 million dollars over five years, solutions are promoted around the world to improve the environment, ecosystems and save the planet. The Basque Government, thanks to the Microsoft initiative, has brought together professionals and experts from the administration, universities, technology centers, companies and startups who have worked for two days to generate ideas and solutions around six topics that represent the main challenges in the Basque Country: renewable energies, mobility, agriculture, water, biodiversity and cybersecurity for sustainability.
The multidisciplinary work, developed during the two days, concluded with the choice of two projects, which will be able to attend the AI for Earth world summit, where they will be able to learn about the novelties of the initiative and other professionals and projects that are also struggling in other parts of the world. world to preserve the planet. The two winning projects will receive a funding grant consisting of training, technical advice, support from Microsoft experts and $ 15,000 for the use of the Microsoft Azure cloud platform, where AI is put at the service of the environment to solve the problems. current challenges of the planet.
Clean energy
MarIA, the first of the winning projects, is a platform for the study of the behavior of floating wind turbines that aims to optimize its design to maximize the production of clean energy, key to combating climate change. The project is led by Jesús María Blanco, professor in the Department of Nuclear Engineering and Fluid Mechanics at the University of the Basque Country; Gregorio Iglesias, Professor of Offshore Wind Energy at University College Cork in Ireland; and Lander Galera, PhD student in the Master of Offshore Wind Energy at the University of the Basque Country. His research activity is part of the JRL-ORE (Joint Research Lab. – Offshore Renewable Energy), formed by the University of the Basque Country, Tecnalia and BCAM (Basque Center for Applied Mathematics).
The capacity of Azure, together with the application of artificial intelligence, allows taking into account all the variables that affect the system of a wind turbine, such as the direction, period and height of the waves, and the real speed of the wind. The use of AI to optimize the coupling of all forces, as well as its training to be able to anticipate different operating states, is vital for the academic and industrial interest of a tool of this type.
The first objective pursued by this research will be the validation of the coupling, comparing the results of the movement of the platform through simulations with data obtained in laboratories. This phase of the study will last 3 months and will allow the optimization of both a neural network in the use of data exchange, as well as the optimization of the computational fluid dynamics mesh. After this, we will begin with the creation of a code that manages to couple the different software developments that study both the turbine, the platform and the anchoring lines.
Meanwhile, the first form of coupling will be evaluated for different platforms and sea states, as well as the combination of different wind speeds and directions, for each state. E sta comparison between platforms, and calculation of the power generated is expected to last four months, until December 2020.
Preservation of the pine forests of the Basque Country
AIonForest, the second of the winning projects, seeks to obtain, through the artificial intelligence of Microsoft Azure, a better knowledge of the defoliator fungus attack that occurred in summer 2018. In this way, a series of actions are proposed to quantify the effect of climate, location and forestry on the advance of these types of diseases, with a view to preventing similar episodes in the future.
The project is led by Alejandro Cantero, Forestry Engineer at Hazi Fundazioa; Amaia Ortiz, Director of Plant Production and Protection at Neiker; Fabia Silva, Co-founder of Dronak; Jorge Paz, Researcher at Tecnalia; José Luis Lavín, Researcher of the Department of Applied Mathematics at Neiker; Máximo Calvo, Co-founder of Karten Space; and Xabier Garitano, Head of the GIS System area at Hazi Fundazioa.
According to Alejandro Cantero, Forestry Engineer at Hazi Fundazioa, “our interdisciplinary team aims to tackle a problem as complex as the interaction between human actions and damage caused by pests and diseases. Thanks to technology we can access a large volume of information, such as meteorology, satellite images, digital terrain models, forest maps – and with Microsoft’s AI we hope to extract results and conclusions that allow us to preserve our forests. “
The project development period is 1 year. The first phase will focus on data mining, collection and integration of formats, with the help of data downloading, cognitive search for new variables of interest, and data integration and standardization. Once this phase is completed, the development of the risk prediction model will begin. For this, data pre-processing will be carried out, supported by machine learning and deep learning from Azure.
