Freedom AUV

About

About Freedom AUV

Freedom follows pipelines, flowlines and umbilicals at altitudes around three to five metres and captures high-resolution sonar, imagery and inspection data during one pass. COMPASS software analyses sonar and computer-vision inputs onboard and triggers closer inspection of free spans, burial changes, crossings and leaks.

The vehicle can deploy from a vessel or operate through a subsea docking station. Resident workflows support recharging, data transfer and tool changes underwater. Oceaneering began commercial pipeline operations in 2023 and has developed Freedom for offshore energy and defence programmes.

Capabilities

Source-backed capabilities

  • Subsea survey and inspection

    Pilot - 2024-05-29 - inspected more than 120 kilometres of subsea pipeline in one North Sea pilot; detected and tracked the pipeline while maintaining a defined flight envelope - environment: North Sea subsea pipeline route for TotalEnergies

    Source

Research

  • Task-Semantic Graph-Driven Distributed Agent Networking for Underwater Target Tracking

    2026-05-15 - Research Publication - This paper addresses these issues by developing an open-source MARL-AUV platform that integrates DI-engine with a six-degree-of-freedom underwater AUV target-tracking simulator.

    Source
  • Pushing subsea boundaries with hybrid AUV/ROV

    2023-05-01 - Research Publication - The Hydro International technical article, based on OTC-32520-MS, describes Freedom AUV/ROV building blocks, autonomy, sensor payloads, and design choices for long-term deepwater surveys and subsea inspection.

    Source

Context

Comparable Systems