Case Study: Ontario Power Generation automates high-risk circuit breaker racking with Boston Dynamics Spot

Ontario Power Generation wanted to see if Spot could be used to assist in tripping and racking out a breaker—an activity that is high risk for arc flash

Ontario Power Generation (OPG) faced the high-risk challenge of performing circuit breaker tripping and racking, a task with a significant danger of arc flash incidents. This hazardous work previously required extensive system outages and lengthy delays for safety. To address this, OPG worked with vendor Boston Dynamics to deploy its Spot robot to remove humans from harm's way.

Boston Dynamics developed a fully automated solution using Spot’s dexterous arm. This allowed the entire breaker operation to be performed autonomously based on high-level human commands. The result eliminated a direct hazard for workers, prevented the need for a larger and longer system outage that would have taken months to arrange, and streamlined the process to be more efficient and repeatable than the previous manual method.

Ontario Power Generation

Mike Di Lisi

Innovation Coordinator