Robotic Inspection and Maintenance of Energy Infrastructure: A Review

Energy facilities play a crucial role in enabling efficient energy generation, storage, transmission, and distribution. Ensuring the operational efficiency, safety, and longevity of these facilities requires continuous inspection and maintenance. Traditional maintenance methods are often labor-intensive, costly, and pose safety risks for human workers. With advancements in robotics and artificial intelligence (AI), automated robotic systems have emerged as promising solutions to enhance the reliability, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness of energy facility maintenance. This paper presents a comprehensive review of robotic technologies for the inspection and maintenance of diverse energy infrastructure, including power plants, wind and solar farms, oil and gas pipelines, electricity transmission lines, and substations. A total of 72 relevant research journal articles were analyzed and categorized based on robotic system types, sensing technologies, technical approaches, addressed tasks, and target energy infrastructure. Furthermore, the paper discusses key limitations such as the predominance of inspection over maintenance tasks, the absence of general-purpose robotic platforms, and the reliance on simulations over real-world deployments, and it suggests future directions for robotic inspection and maintenance of energy infrastructure. The review aims to provide researchers, engineers, and industry professionals with insights into the potential of robotics in enhancing the resilience and efficiency of energy facilities.