A canine has been skilled to smell out faults in energy networks that lie deep underground to assist maintain electrical energy flowing this winter.
The springer spaniel, named Jac, has been skilled by SP Energy Networks (SPEN) at a substation within the city of Renfrew close to Glasgow.
The canine is ready to odor oil and hydrocarbon gases by earth and tarmac.
He makes use of his entrance paw to pinpoint the location of a fault, saving engineers from digging holes to seek out the supply of the issue.
Jac has had a 100% success price find faults on 30 events, in line with Scott Mathieson, planning and regulation director at SPEN.
SPEN is liable for 65,000 miles of community and 30,000 substations.
Cables are usually buried 40cm to 80cm underground, however Jac has been capable of finding faults two metres (about 6ft 7in) deep.
“Part of keeping the lights on in an electricity network involves investing in innovation and technology,” Mr Mathieson stated.
“We’re used to utilizing laser expertise, flying the community with drones, however Jac provides to our armoury considerably.
“He is a sniffer dog and we’ve been piloting using Jac to help us detect cable faults in particular.”
Mr Mathieson defined: “So when cables fail, if they’re oil-filled, they let off some oil that lets off hydrocarbon gases or the insulation breaking down lets particulate levels of hydrocarbons off.
“Jac is a springer spaniel whose sense of odor is 1000’s of instances more practical than a human being, and he can detect precisely the place the cables have a weak point in them.
“The benefit of that is that we can repair the cable actually before it fails and improve customer experiences.”
Source: information.sky.com”