Underground Construction - June 2017 - 2

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EDITOR'S LOG
By Robert Carpenter, Editor-in-Chief

Tech Driven

It is said that the last 50 years have seen
more accumulation of knowledge and technological developments than in all the previous
history of mankind. Today, technology, on an
annual basis, is advancing geometrically. It
has changed our lives in ways we cannot even
begin to fathom - and our economics as well.
As I was compiling the wealth of information from our exclusive 19th Annual Underground Construction Horizontal Directional
Drilling Survey, technology kept springing
to mind. Nowhere in the fast-paced, big-iron
infrastructure construction industry is technological advancement more apparent than
in the HDD market.
From an initial concept and experimentation by Dick Melsheimer with small directional equipment for utilities in Los Angeles,
to the large rig development by Martin
Cherrington and co-workers, today's fleet of
HDD rigs and equipment represents a radical
change from the 1960s - more than those pioneers could have possibly envisioned.
Early HDD development saw frequent
quantum leaps in the hardware, steadily making the equipment more reliable, accurate
and durable. With that kind of rapid advance,
it wasn't long before utilities beyond oil and
gas pipelines saw the advantage of using the
small version of HDD rigs.
The first telecom construction boom hit
like a tidal wave and swept the small rig
market into unimaginable economic heights.
HDD was the perfect technology at the right
time. Again, technology kept improving
the equipment. Even after the telecom bust
brought the HDD industry crashing back to
reality, technology moved the equipment forward, but now in a different tangent.
While refinements and enhancements
in the iron and steel of the machine are still
progressing, the quantum leaps are now
coming with electronics and software. From
locating to steering to bore planning, digital
equipment continually adds new features
and benefits. It was not long ago that small
and mid-sized rigs required operators to use
levers and switches. Now it's joysticks. You
can't hardly buy a machine today that doesn't
have a built-in digital touchscreen to activate
and operate multitudes of features.
Technology in our private lives is becoming
directly linked to our industry. It's no wonder
that companies such as Ditch Witch and Vermeer have developed various forms of simu-

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lators and VR devices for training, as that is
how the new workforce learns and navigates
through daily life.
A friend recently told me how technology
has changed his workplace. He's an engineer,
but his point is applicable to much of the underground infrastructure market. He related
how businesses used to have an "additive"
approach to projects where they would tackle
a task or solve a challenge by starting at the
bottom and then adding pieces to the puzzle
until the job was complete. Now, there seems
to be more of an "edited" approach. When
we start a project, we look for corollaries or
similar projects from the past, pull out that
template, then revise to meet current needs.
Technology has made us more participatory and collaborative in our approaches. Our
customers demand immediate results and
information.
I recently read of an ironic technology
twist. In India, technology enabled that country to raise a generation of engineers and
various types of technology experts. Through
communications advances, India became
the "information and help" workforce of the
world. Now, that tech has become a double-edged sword. In April, more than 200,000
workers were laid off in a single day, as the
need for call centers is dropping precipitously. Technology has already leapt ahead, and
the demand for call centers remains tentative
at best. More massive layoffs are planned.
The "human" component is still a crucial
aspect of all technological advancements.
There are always gaps in automation requiring new specializations for people to fill those
gaps. But we also don't want to become so
caught up in keeping pace with fast-paced
technology advancements and automation
that we fail to "stop and smell the roses."
In general, technology has always been
both a benefit and a challenge at the same
time. With the inevitable advances of the artificial intelligence component of technology, I
can't help but wonder if technology will eventually supersede our capacity to adapt?
As much as our society has advanced over
the past 50 years, at this pace I would not
even venture a guess as to where we'll be in
another 50 years. Should be quite a ride.

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Underground Construction - June 2017

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