The project, titled ‘Fibre Bragg Grating-Based Real-Time and Low Maintenance Strain Monitoring of Existing Assets’, won the Innovation in Instrumentation and Monitoring award which recognises innovation and excellence in site surveying and monitoring on tunnelling projects.
The CSIC team, led by Dr Sinan Açikgöz, former post-doctorate fellow at CSIC (funded by the Royal Commission of the Great Exhibition of 1851) and currently Associate Professor, Department of Engineering Science, University of Oxford, devised a fibre optic monitoring system for direct and real-time monitoring of Christopher Wren’s Grade-1 listed St Mary Abchurch and George Dance’s Mansion House during the station upgrade.
The monitoring system also won the New Civil Engineer (NCE) TechFest 2018 Award for Research Impact which was presented to the winning team in September. CSIC Programme Manager Dee Dee Frawley said: “We are delighted to have won this prestigious award as a result of our continued research on fibre optic sensing that has transformed an emerging technology into a robust long-term sensing system that delivers real benefits to asset owners.
“This real-time monitoring project using state-of-the-art technology enabled savings in excess of £1m an led to an improved understanding of structural behaviour during tunneling, which will enable further saving in future projects”.
The CSIC monitoring system was also nominated for the Innovation in Technical Product or Equipment Award, which was won by Dragados for The Orion, also used at Bank Station.
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Read more about this project in the CSIC Annual Review 2018, p.14-15: