Bureau Veritas provides vision of the future with HoloLens technology

Bureau Veritas, a world leader in testing, inspection and certification services,is using cutting edge technology to reduce costs for clients – while increasing safety for engineers at the same time. This is a part of BV’s ‘Twintelligence’ campaign of twinning expertise with technology.

The global firm’s new HoloLens equipment overcomes the challenge of engineers trying to inspect hard-to-access assets by bringing them to life anywhere in the world. The Microsoft mixed reality smart glasses, Hololens, deliver an augmented reality hologram that enables inspection experts to view parts, understand inspection requirements and digitally splice the asset to view cross-sections. The Bureau Veritas solutions are being developed in conjunction with Smart Document Solutions Ltd.

The technology allows Bureau Veritas to blend real and virtual worlds, allowing physical and digital visualisation to co-exist. The mixed reality headsets display interactive menus that bring assets and faults to life digitally, reducing site training time by 50%.

Bureau Veritas can even introduce defects to enhance the training scope and provide greater learning opportunities, while at the same time maintaining the high standards of service and safety the company has become renowned for. The HoloLens technology is revolutionising how Bureau Veritas trains its engineers on difficult to access assets, and provides more detailed inspection results faster and safer than ever before – for both the client and engineer.

Bureau Veritas UK Accreditation Manager Rachel Rawlings said: “The Testing Inspection and Certification (TIC) industry has a reputation for being relatively slow to develop compared to others, but we’re proud to be leading the sector in this way. Innovations like HoloLens help our engineers, inspectors and auditors to deliver a better service and our clients are already noticing the benefits. Through using technology in this way, it enables engineers to do their job safer, quicker or more efficiently.

“In the Technical, Quality and Risk (TQR) team we have the phrase ‘safer, faster, better’, which we try to apply to everything we do. For example, Microsoft HoloLens enables hard-to-access assets such as pressure equipment to be brought into a training room using mixed reality. This enables our specialists to provide training safely on systems which can’t be accessed as they are normally in service, as well as giving visibility of faults and issues which may only be seen a couple of times in a career.

“Each set of technology comes with its own set of challenges and risks which we always take into consideration when trialling and using. HoloLens will not fully replace onsite training as there is still a need for physical inspection on some sites, but it does speed up and enhance the process for our engineers.”

Bureau Veritas are on stand #1D61 at Offshore Europe this week to demonstrate how the equipment can benefit customers. Visitors will be able to see the HoloLens technology being used on the ISO Tank, which is a blended training solution integrating the holographic model and videos. Bureau Veritas will also be showcasing its new technology on the Steam Tube Boiler, which the company is currently using to train PSSR Surveyors.  The full size model will enable surveyors to see all possible defects in real time.