Västerbergslagens Elnät, part of Vattenfall Group, Ludvika and Fagersta municipality, rapidly scaled their use of AI-powered inspections. After a focused proof of concept, they moved to a full rollout of their distribution grid in just six months—demonstrating what’s possible with committed leadership and the right tools. VB Elnät is a great example of piloting and scaling operations rapidly by focusing on key success factors, and setting a clear test.

POC Phase:

• Power lines inspected: 44 km
• Service: 2D inspections of RGB images where ¼ was a detailed assessment to compare the full range of services with regular annual inspections
• Captured by: External drone partner
• Results: Over 130 defects and findings
• Timeline: Less than 12 months from POC decision to full rollout

The POC met and exceeded expectations regarding both efficiency and results, showing not only how this solution can be deployed but also how the results can impact their maintenance and vegetation operations.

Full Rollout:

With the POC done, VB Elnät quickly took the step to not only expand this to their whole grid, but also add additional data sources and more detailed assessments to make the most of their aerial data capture through Arkion’s AI-powered analysis. 

• Power lines inspected: Entire grid (~500 km)
• Services:
  
  • 2D inspections
  • Detailed assessments
  • 3D and vegetation analysis
• Integration: Secure Single Sign-On (SSO) via VB Elnät’s MS Azure

“The difference in working with Arkion's platform is enormous. It gives us a much clearer overview of our power grid and makes it much easier to identify components and detect defects – many of which would have gone unnoticed with our previous way of working. This is a major step forward in moving from reactive to proactive maintenance.” — Torbjörn Jonsson, Maintenance Engineer, VB Elnät