Autonomous Inspection at a High-Alpine Hydropower Plant

Executive
Summary

illwerke vkw AG needed to replace manual, weather-dependent inspection rounds at a remotely operated hydropower plant located at 1,700 metres in the Austrian Alps - an environment where access is difficult, conditions are hazardous, and the cost of missed anomalies is high.

By deploying the Korial platform with a Boston Dynamics Spot robot, illwerke vkw decoupled routine inspection from human presence, enabling autonomous missions that navigate the plant's corridors and staircases, read instrumentation, and detect thermal and environmental anomalies with machine-grade consistency.

The pilot, run in collaboration with HydroLab - illwerke vkw's dedicated hydropower innovation group - established a repeatable model for safer, always-on inspection across the company's wider portfolio of power generation sites.

The Challenge

Manual Inspections in a Remote, High-Risk Environment

The Obervermuntwerk II (OVW II) hydroelectric power plant is controlled entirely from a remote operations centre - yet routine inspection still required employees to make the journey to site, regardless of season or conditions.

Located where the Silvretta reservoir drops 291 metres to Lake Vermunt, OVW II sits in alpine terrain that becomes particularly difficult to access in winter. For a facility that must maintain continuous operational standards, the dependency on manual rounds introduced risk on two fronts: the physical exposure of employees travelling and working in a challenging environment, and the inherent inconsistency of inspection data gathered by rotating personnel under variable conditions.

Pressure readings, flow rates, pipe temperatures, and leak indicators all demanded regular monitoring - but the frequency and reliability of that monitoring was constrained by what human inspection logistics could realistically sustain.

The Solution

Autonomous, Always-On Inspection with Korial and Spot

illwerke vkw selected Korial's platform and Boston Dynamics Spot to automate inspection rounds at OVW II, enabling the plant to be monitored continuously and consistently without requiring personnel on site.

Equipped with LiDAR, optical cameras, and thermal imaging, Spot follows predefined autonomous routes through the facility - navigating narrow corridors, ascending and descending stairs, and completing full inspection circuits with repeat accuracy. The Korial platform orchestrates these missions, processes the sensor data Spot collects, and surfaces actionable insight to remote operators.

In practice, the system reads values directly from instrumentation, captures thermal images to identify pipe defects and temperature anomalies, and monitors for leaks or contamination - detecting deviations early, before they escalate into unplanned downtime. All data feeds into a centralised operational view, replacing fragmented manual records with a consistent, machine-generated dataset.

Korial's Click and Inspect capability adds a further layer of operational resilience: by maintaining a digital twin of the plant environment, operators can direct Spot remotely to any specific inspection point on demand. In the event of a fault or unusual reading, teams can deploy the robot to investigate without anyone needing to travel to site — a meaningful safety advantage in adverse alpine conditions.

The pilot was conducted in partnership with HydroLab, illwerke vkw's competence group for hydropower innovation, with teams testing a range of scenarios to validate how autonomous inspection can support safer, more efficient plant operations at scale.