NEDO, Fukushima pref. sign cooperation pact on robot tests

November 23, 2017

Koriyama, Fukushima Pref.- The New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization on Wednesday concluded a cooperation pact with the Fukushima prefectural government on the development of technologies for demonstration tests for drones and robots.

The organization, better known as NEDO, aims to establish technologies to accurately measure the durability and safety of drones and robots, utilizing the Fukushima Robot Test Field, a planned large test site over 50 hectares that straddles the city of Minamisoma and the town of Namie in a coastal region in the northeastern Japan prefecture.

The Fukushima government is building the site as part of efforts to revitalize the coastal region, devastated by the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami and the subsequent nuclear accident at Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc.'s Fukushima No. 1 power plant. The test site will partly enter into service in fiscal 2018.

Various demonstration tests will be conducted there, such as one to check a robot's capabilities to conduct underwater inspections of old dams using a 7-meter-deep pool.

NEDO plans to develop technology to check whether drones can fly stably in strong wind. For this, the central government-linked organization will use a wind tunnel facility to be set up in the site.

People related to robot development across the world will gather in the experimental site, NEDO Chairman Kazuo Furukawa said at a ceremony to mark the conclusion of the pact, held in the city of Koriyama, also Fukushima Prefecture.

"We will continue working toward a society in which robots and drones are actively used," Furukawa said.

Fukushima Governor Masao Uchibori said he hopes to make his prefecture the birthplace of a "robot industrial revolution." Jiji Press