Empireo| Internet on the Ocean

Project Details

Awards & Nominations

Empireo has received the following awards and nominations. Way to go!

Local Peoples' Choice Winner
Global Nominee

The Challenge | Internet on the Ocean

The internet is not easily accessible in many areas of the world, like the Earth’s oceans. Fishermen, sailors, and others have limited data connection with the rest of the world. Although satellite internet is widely available, it is very expensive for a user to implement. Your challenge is to design a low-cost method of delivering internet to people located far away on the ocean.

ONet

Using DTN protocol to provide a stable internet connection on the ocean.

Empireo

CHALLENGE

The challenge chosen by the team was “Internet on the Ocean”, where we had to develop a solution to provide internet connection on the oceans. First of all, we research existing solutions to this problem, and we concluded that the most common way is satellite internet.

In most cases, the internet satellite costs are very expensive and consumption are very limited, being a challenge for personal users to implement this solution. Furthermore, due to weather on middle of the ocean, the connectivity is very damaged.

WHAT IS ONET

Onet utilizes Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networking (DNT) technology, which is a NASA solution for taking trusted internet as space missions.

According NASA’s website, communicating from Earth to any spacecraft is a complex challenge, largely due to the extreme distances involved. When data are transmitted and received across thousands and even millions of miles, the delay and potential for disruption or data loss is significant.

Future explorations will need much more complex communication, with data transfer between many nodes. These transmissions will need to operate like the Internet here on Earth, involving multiple hops via relay spacecraft and other intermediate nodes, creating the foundation for a Solar System Internet (SSI). Like the terrestrial Internet, the SSI will offer users a well defined, standardized platform upon which to build a wide variety of applications by accessing end-to-end network services. The SSI will utilize the Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN) protocol suite, which can be used in any scenario, including those with longer light times or frequent link disruptions, where conventional Internet Protocols (IP) fail.

The DTN protocol provides assured delivery of data using automatic store and forward mechanisms. Each data packet that is received is forwarded immediately if possible, but stored for future transmission if forwarding is not currently possible but is expected to be possible in the future. As a result, only the next hop needs to be available when using DTN, that is, this architecture doesn't need continuous paths between endpoints. The DTN suite also contains network management, security, routing and quality of service capabilities, which are similar to the capabilities provided by the terrestrial Internet suite.

Even though DTN was developed with space applications in mind, the benefits hold true for terrestrial applications where frequent disruptions and high error rates are common.

We can implement the DTN protocol to provide internet communication over the ocean, enabling a secure and stable connection.

The idea is to transmit the internet signal from the coastal regions directionally to nearby buoys, these buoys work as nodes sending the signal to the nearest nodes, which may be vessels or buoys with ONet installed. Every vessel with ONet equipment automatically becomes a node as it receives and transmits data from other nodes.

For the transmission to occur at high speed the equipment itself checks using gps signal to know the location of the nearby node and to be able to direct the data to the nearst node, thus creating a vast network in the ocean.

The use of the existing buoys in the ocean in the what makes the project viable, with minor modifications to the existing buoys it is possible to adapt them with ONet equipment, lining the chain that holds the buoy to the ocean floor with carbon fiber, a textile tecnology that generates energy by stretching and compressing the carbon nanotubes in the fiber.

By adding carbon fiber or increasing PV module it would be possible to generate the energy needed for the equipment to operate on the buoys, another factor is the mainteance that is already performed on them after a few years at sea.

VIABILITY

By not using satellite internet, the cost of ONet will be lower than the current cost of internet available at sea. The material needed to apply the idea already exists, as existing buoys with PV modules can be retrofitted with DTN technology equipment, and carbon fiber implemented to ensure that communication will not cease even with some difficulty with the PV modules, maintenance of existing buoys takes place at least two years, and this can be maintained, knowing that the equipment for use of the DTN protocol and the carbon fiber have a duration longer than two years.

The viability of communication can be noted by the successful sending of the photo from Antartica to the Space Station, where even with minimal infrastructure there was the possibility of communication.

The greater the adhesion of ONet by vessels, the more nodes available, which significantly increases the quality of service, and faster message delivery, because each new receiver will also be a new node.

ONET IMPACT

Many fishermen other people working on the high seas spend days in the ocean without contact with the coast, or at the risk of lack of communication to call for emergency relief. ONet brings low cost internet to low income people who can't afford a traditional satellite service.

In addition to security, the Internet can provide sea workers with a variety of information that can assist them in their work, such as tide information, ocean mapping, location, wheater, and others to assist in the development of the work and the safety of those who risk themselves at sea.

Because ONet connects land and ocean locally, it can be applied worldwide without political restrictions, as each country's maritime boundary connectivity would be submitted to its own Internet laws. This would allow ONet application in countries where the internet is more limited such as China and Antarctic. They would be providing connectivity to their regions, but would still positively impact all the world conectivity.

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