‘The challenge is to establish a connection between space and the underwater world’
Intecs operates within the National Space Programme. Scuppa: “Research centres and companies are working to develop sensors that enable direct links between satellites and underwater infrastructure.”
‘The Earth is a fine place and worth fighting for.’ It is in this quote by Ernest Hemingway that the spirit of Intecs can be summed up: ‘a group that, since 1974, has been providing IT engineering services and products for safety-critical and mission-critical electronic systems, and designs and develops applications, software tools and hardware components for sectors such as aerospace, defence, transport and Fintech, including in collaboration with leading Italian and European industries, organisations and universities”, explains Andrea Scuppa, Defence & Traffic Control Line Business Manager at Intecs.
The company attended the event ‘The Underwater Realm. Italy: A Leading Player in the Global Underwater World’, held at the Molo dei Bersaglieri in Trieste. This was an opportunity to discuss the challenges facing Italy in safeguarding underwater infrastructure and resources. We know far more about what lies in space or on other planets and moons in the Solar System than we do about what lies beneath our seas.
Less than 30 per cent of the seabed has been mapped, and there is an ever-increasing need for people to be able to access what lies beneath the water. A direct consequence of this is the security of the infrastructure itself, whether it be data or power cables, gas or oil pipelines, or extraction sites. The most fascinating and complex frontier in this regard is known as Space & Blue and represents the strategic convergence between satellite technologies and the underwater environment.
At the heart of Intecs’ involvement in the National Diving Centre lies the protection of critical infrastructure in the immediate vicinity. As Scuppa explains, ‘this type of protection is designed on three levels, starting with a command and control system that must ensure situation awareness in the underwater domain, gathering information from underwater sensors whilst also communicating with external assets, such as satellite constellations’. A concrete example: a naval vessel operating with a trawling anchor poses a threat, as it could sever data and power cables.
Yet, ensuring that space and the deep sea can coexist presents significant physical challenges. “Transmitting information underwater is not that easy, as the satellite signal does not reach such depths as it is,” points out Stefano Barsotti, Aerospace Line of Business Manager at Intecs. Hence the need to develop new architectures: “In the short to medium term, we will need a surface layer to act as an information relay, whilst we await solutions that allow for more direct use.”
