Navalio

Biodiversity underpins the health of the planet and has a direct impact on all our lives. which means if there is a biodiversity crisis, our health and livelihoods are at risk as well.

At the dam site, there are water flow problems for bigger fish, and temperature sensitivity for all kinds of species. But the regular 'fish way' can only let native non-endangered species go through, but those endangered species (fish and dolphin) are not being protected.

The NAVALIO a river smart robot multi-functional system can automatically control water temperature, maintain homeostasis (like humans but in fish), and initiate whirlpool to gently guide fish and dolphins to correct destination.

Allowing fish to the spawn area which will then increase the food supply, and protecting the river dolphin will protect biodiversity because all species are inter-connected and vital to a healthy planet.

While the construction of dams provides energy and water control to humanity, it causes various environmental harm. The Dam divides the river into two “separate” part. On one side of the dam, the fish are overpopulated. On the other side, it’s totally the opposite that there’s barely any species. This situation created a huge imbalance to the aquatic ecosystem.

“Approximately three billion people in the world rely on both wild-caught and farmed seafood as their primary source of protein.” This dependency will be endangered if fish can not migrate in their normal way. And for dolphins," River dolphins can act as population trend indicators in degraded freshwater systems. The decline of it represents the habitat fragmentation and species extirpation in freshwater ecosystems."

Dams divide rivers, creating upstream and downstream habitats; but migratory fish depends on the whole river flow. Dams block their ability to travel back upstream. They also rely on temperature triggers and shallow areas for reproduction. Because dams change how rivers flow, the water temperature and natural conditions also change. Extreme shifts in temperature and conditions prevent species from mating and/or hinders the development of fish larvae.

We are trying to prevent dolphins from going the way of Baiji which once lived in the Yangtze river for 20 million years, and now is gone. The planet is dependent on the fish to survive; without this food supply, catastrophic results will occur, leading to resource wars and famine.

The NAVALIO is a river smart robot multi-functional system that can automatically control water temperature, maintain homeostasis (like humans but in fish), and initiate a whirlpool to gently guide fish and dolphins to correct destinations navigating past dams. We want to make the water temperature friendly so all the fish can easily travel through the river. (But we don’t want to genetically change the fish and the dolphin).

The Bots create a non-destructive whirlpool that pushes the fish into a fishway -- the flow of current is controlled by our smart underwater autonomous robots. We will help dolphins enter an elevator box that will transport them from the fishway to the other side of the dam.

Swarm Intelligence will allow robots to communicate with each other.. Sensors can help to detect the species and their health conditions. NAVALIO will maintain water temperature. In addition, the sonar system will detect detailed information about fish and dolphins and communicate with the whirlpool where it send signals to the whirlpool turbines.

As the fish reach 500 meters from the dam, the sensor systems along each side of the river  bank will detect each individual species as well as the total amount . Then, when the species reach halfway to the dam, the sonar system web on the river bottom will detect fish’s body conditions and more detailed information that will be then sent to the coordinating office on the land. This will be important as our data collection will be available to all researchers. After all of the information is collected, the sonar system will then send signals to the turbine to divide the fish and dolphin to either the fishway or the lifting box for the transportation across the dam.