AI robot makes money for NCC by detecting boulders
NCC Industry is increasing the efficiency and control of the site-intake of aggregates. Detecting truck loads with boulders, rocks too large to fit into the crushing machine, has been a problem for years. Now, an AI-robot has solved that problem, and as a bonus, the costs have decreased.
It's just after midnight and trucks loaded with excavated rock from the ongoing metro expansion are rolling into NCC Industry's site just outside Stockholm. Every truckload is weighed in, photographed, and registered by the driver - and for some time now analyzed with the help of AI. At the four sites where the technology is used, invoicing has increased significantly.
“For years we have had issues with detecting loads containing single boulders. Rock that is so large that it must be processed and fractured into smaller pieces before it can be put into the crushing machine, which means additional costs for us”, explains Area Manager East Stefan Westlén.
“An increased dialogue with our customer of how we can help to solve their problems is only good.”, The metro extension in Stockholm is a good example of a narrow workplace where the customer quickly and smoothly needs to get rid of blasted rock to be able to continue working.”
Existing technology adapted to our need
The manual handling where the driver weighs and registers the load himself means that there could be errors – unknowingly or deliberately, and that NCC loses revenue.
Pauline Broberg, at NCC Industry's customer center in Borås identified significant potential for improvement in the intake process. Niklas Bruske, who works with IT development, suggested to use the data in the form of photos from the Viktoria weighing system.
The technology to detect boulders is based on recognition of data that is registered at weigh-in.
"We have started from existing technology from Microsoft, which we have adapted to our needs. The result was the AI-robot "Allan Ivrig", which has been trained to identify so-called boulders. It has been fun and very good cooperation with the colleagues at the customer center and two sites where we tested the technique”, says Niklas Bruske.
"Now we can check all the loads, which we couldn't do before. To continue training "Allan Ivrig" we carry out a manual check of the deviation report we receive every morning. The data we receive means that we can invoice for loads containing boulders that is not actively registered," says Pauline Broberg.
Customer dialogue on new perspectives of aggregates and costs
The technique brings a new perspective of aggregates and costs, and a need of an increased dialogue with the customers.
“Our customer knows that boulders are more costly to manage, but they are not used to be invoiced for the cost for a load containing single boulders. When we explain why we do this, it is normally not any problems”, says Pauline Broberg.
“The technique is ready to be used widely, but it requires investment and decisions on how to develop it and to better understand how we manage the data we receive, to really be able to make informed decisions”, Stefan Westlén summarize.