Intelligent geotextiles: wired sensor networks underground

BLDBLOG surveys fascinating "intelligent geotextiles," essentially buried wire webs that act as sensor networks to monitor the landscape above. They remind me a bit of those invisible fences suburbanites use to keep their dogs in the yard. From BLDBLOG:

The Dutch engineering firm TenCate offers a product called the GeoDetect system. It is "the first sensor enabled geotextile on the market to provide soil reinforcement, structural health monitoring and an early warning system into one package."

It is a computational fabric that structurally strengthens and physically monitors the landscapes it is buried within.

"Our 'intelligent geotextile,'" the company points out, "is the first system designed specifically for geotechnical applications and offers a technical solution for monitoring geo-structures for changes in strain, temperature or the combination of the two." As such, it "incorporates a geocomposite fabric, fiber optics, instrumentation equipment and software to provide a innovative solution for the multi-functional requirements of a geotechnical application" (for example, stabilizing landfills and levees).

"DRONE LANDSCAPES, INTELLIGENT GEOTEXTILES, GEOGRAPHIC COUNTERMEASURES" (Thanks, Pat Kelly!)

• [patrick]

  Dutch ENGINEERING firm? I used to sleep under a Ten Cate blanket at my grandparents home thirty years ago! They stuck to weaving apparently.

• [Charlie McHenry]

  Now this will be quite useful in a world of big data. 

• [Matthew Petty]

  This is a logical extension of the current fiber-based temperature and strain monitoring systems that use a single thread of fiber, laser pulses, and mathematical analysis of backscattered light. Instead of a single thread, why not a 2-dimensional mat? USGS use it: http://water.usgs.gov/ogw/bgas/fiber-optics/

• [OtherMichael]

  VENTUS, here we come….