ABB Robots Help Intelligent City Build Ecodome

2021: Using ABB Robots

The Canadian company Intelligent City intends to change the working methods in the construction industry. Intelligent City believes that the time has come with automation and robotics to significantly increase the level of sustainable development of the industry. This was announced on July 27, 2021 by ABB.

Located in Vancouver, the company is an expert in the construction of wooden modules outside the construction site, connecting which you can build buildings up to 18 floors high. Intelligent City can supply turnkey fully finished engineering wood designs. Such buildings are eco-certified and meet the highest energy efficiency standards.

Such a construction solution allows "compacting the development of the city," supporting urban life in accordance with the principles of sustainable development through the development of small or abandoned territories, and not construction on new plots. The use of a single platform, based on modular slabs with built-in communications, allows you to create a construction structure that is quickly built and meets all the requirements of a building with high characteristics.

Intelligent City can also model a digital double building. It allows you to test the characteristics of the project before it is delivered to the construction site.

In the assembly line, ABB robots are used to process, move and assemble large sections from wood. As of July 2021, three robotic systems are in operation, some robots are installed on mobile platforms. Working in cells, robots produce wooden elements of the structure in accordance with projects created in the Intelligent City Platforms for Life (P4L) design software. This allows you to create individual designs for specific customer requirements.

To schedule the tasks and movements of ABB robots, along with the P4L program, the software for autonomous programming of RobotStudio from ABB is used. A separate file is created for each structure element, so you can model the element and start production immediately.

Among the key advantages of using robots are increasing production efficiency, accelerating the project implementation time by 38% and reducing the cost of producing a modular house by 33%.

The RobotStudio program was very useful for optimizing the production line. It simulated the production cell and equipment layout in the factory.