Background and Objectives

Robotic vehicles are just realizing the potential to improve productivity in construction, transportation, agriculture, and mining in the continental U.S., but in the Arctic, research towards using these vehicles is much less advanced. In the Arctic, development still emphasizes building roads and opening shipping lanes. Advanced technologies like autonomous navigation and low-pressure mobility systems offer many potential benefits in the Arctic, such as gentle impact on the environment and wildlife, and economic opportunity for communities. However the region’s remote and extreme environments, extremely low temperatures, poor visibility, and deformable terrain are a challenge for autonomous navigation as it exists today.

The goal of this workshop is to create new conversation among scientists for envisioning how autonomous and robotic transportation might be put to use in the Arctic, and the social, economic, and environmental dimensions that would be entailed in doing so.

There are a few studies of ways to improve efficiency and effectiveness of arctic transportation. A blue ribbon panel established by the White House and NSF in 2012 to assess the U.S. Antarctic Program’s logistics, identified automation of South Pole resupply as the investment opportunity with the largest economic and environmental payoff to the program [USAP 2012]. Using surface transportation costs 58% of air cargo and requires 42% of the fuel while emissions from tractors sleds per pound cargo are less than 1% of aircraft, dramatically reducing environmental impact. The economics of low ground pressure, semi-autonomous traverse for cargo transport in the Arctic may follow similar economics and efficiency. While perhaps not as dramatic as supplying the South Pole, it will almost certainly be positive and is one of many ideas that should be explored in casting the future of Arctic transportation. One our motivation is to examine and understand these positive effects and to conceive new systems of Arctic transportation that produce best economic, social and environmental benefit.

This workshop will explore how we can foster a transdisciplinary fundamental research agenda for next-generation transportation in the Arctic, with the broader goal of improving mobility, business, economics, and quality of life in the Arctic, and participation of local communities in needs assessment, design for local conditions, and education for participation in technology development and application. To encourage convergence, which we define as integrating the methods, theories, and cultures of relevant disciplines, we are creating a workshop that will involve discussion and active engagement of experts from many disciplines, including arctic science, computer science, robotics, human-computer interaction, social and economic sciences, education science, and governance and policy studies. Collectively, the group will explore topics that cross disciplines, and could encourage research that would advance autonomous and robotic transportation in the Arctic.

The objectives of this workshop are to:

● Communicate and understand the primary environmental, economic and social issues in transportation in the arctic

● Identify new technologies and how they can improve arctic transportation

● Recommend areas of research and policy development to foster future transportation

The outcomes of the workshop will be a framework for new research priorities, partnerships, collaborations, and approaches. Multiple stakeholders will be asked to discuss key autonomous transportation themes. For each research theme, attendees will specify a set of open problems, research challenges, and action items to bring the research to fruition. Our list of participants includes computer scientists, social scientists, designers, educators, policy experts, polar study experts, and those working with communities in the Arctic. We intend for scientists and community members to jointly contribute to the workforce in meaningful ways.

Topics

1. How can we apply progress in robotics and autonomous vehicles in extreme environments (e.g., under the sea, in disaster zones, in deserts) towards success in the Arctic? How does the Arctic offer similar or different challenges?

2. How will methods of transportation change as new technologies for sensing, modeling and planning develop? Guidance, control and safeguarding individual vehicles, coordination between vehicles, utilization of intelligent infrastructure, global communication and observation, all of these should be considered.

3. How would the nature of work change (such as fishing, delivery services, tourism, medical services, police work), and what new work systems or businesses would be needed? What kinds of educational opportunities would have to be offered to develop local skills and knowledge for workers in autonomous navigation organizations.

4. What are the potential economic implications of using autonomous navigation in the Arctic?

5. What are the risks and benefits of new systems of transportation on the environment (tundra, permafrost, wildlife, and so forth)? What would be required of robots and vehicles to create quiet, gentle, secure, helpful navigation?

6. Are there obvious needs that autonomous navigation could address (such as deliveries to remote communities)? What do community members suggest?

Contact

David Wettergreen dsw@cmu.edu

Jodi Forlizzi forlizzi@cs.cmu.edu

George Kantor kantor@ri.cmu.edu

Support

This workshop is sponsored by the Navigating the New Arctic program of the U.S. National Science Foundation. We gratefully acknowledge support under grant OPP-1744410.